


fractals and wholes

by bicarolina, lumailia



Series: frible cinematic universe [1]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Adam just sucks, Angst, Bed-sharing, F/F, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, Lots of that, Mutual Pining, a little gory but not super graphic, canonverse, post v5, post volume 5, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-05
Packaged: 2019-07-25 10:24:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16195631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bicarolina/pseuds/bicarolina, https://archiveofourown.org/users/lumailia/pseuds/lumailia
Summary: "She studies the girl who has chosen never to leave her."





	fractals and wholes

 

+

Weiss’s blood is everywhere.

            Yang can see it shiny on the floor, red blurred over frozen white. It’s on her hands, too. Drying. She looks down and finds it ground into her boots, seeping up the fabric of her pants.

            She’s going to be sick.

            Everything smells like metal, like metal and dust and the sharp, heady tang of ice that’s been cold for too long. Yang falls to her knees. More blood, more dust. The chill of the ice spears her all the way up her legs but colder still is the pale, unmoving hand she twines with her own.

            Weiss’s eyes are closed. Yang doesn’t know what she’d do if they weren’t, if she had to lean over her body and see Weiss’s glassy, empty stare fixed on an unforgiving sky. But Weiss’s eyes are closed, and they do not flutter even as one last, featherlight breath leaves her body.

            Yang thinks she’s screaming now, but she isn’t sure. The sight of her dearest friend bloodied and broken has split her world to fractals, thrown her senses off balance. She can’t hear over the smell of metal. She can’t hear over the feeling of ice-numbed fingers in her own. She can’t hear over the grief and rage and regret that are burning up her throat like bile, flaring in her every nerve.

            Hands come to rub her shoulders. Ren’s, steady and gentle. Nora bundles herself on the ice beside her, looping one arm through her own. Blake’s shadow covers her, a quiet guardian. And then Ruby, her brave little sister—maybe the bravest of them all, right now—kneels beside Weiss and gathers her in her arms, stroking her hair back into perfection, just like it was before the battle.

            The fire inside of Yang comes down her cheeks as water and salt.

            But there shouldn’t be time for mourning. There _isn’t_ time for mourning. Yang rises out of blood and ice with tightened fists, her vision bounded in simmering red.

            She turns, and it isn’t Blake behind her anymore, but Cinder. Her eyes dance with flames that aren’t hers.

            “What?” she taunts. “Are you going to throw a temper tantrum?”

            This time, she is. Her best friend is dead—never has one of her breakdowns been more warranted.

            Yang’s fist flies into Cinder’s face. It shatters like glass. Like ice.

            Then Yang jolts awake to a dark room and the quiet trilling of crickets.

 _Just a dream,_ Yang tells herself as she eases herself onto her elbows, struggling to rein in her breath. It was all just a terrible dream, one in a countless string of them. But Yang’s body can’t quite compute that, yet. She breathes deeply, just like she’s supposed to, and it’s useless—her chest constricts, cuing her body for a breakdown.

            She keeps resisting. Deep breaths, one after another. In for four, out for eight. And if that fails, there’s always Weiss across the room, fast asleep, and Yang can sync the rhythm of her breaths to hers.

            Yang freezes. Chills pucker her skin as fear drives like a point of ice through her stomach.

            She can’t hear Weiss’s breathing.

            Sharply, she jerks her head towards the bed beside her where Weiss should be, blankets only halfway on because she insists she can only sleep when it’s cold. But the bed is empty, the covers turned down in a neat, deliberate fashion, as if no one had been sleeping there at all.

            A thud from outside sends Yang to her feet. She crosses the room and tucks aside the curtains, peers through the window. At the distant end of the terrace, she spots a blur of Ren and Nora dancing to the music of the crickets. _Cute_ , she thinks, but they aren’t Weiss, which means right now, they’re not important.

            Yang moves in the other direction, throwing open the door to their dorm room and crossing into the hallway. Another rush of panic hits her, kicking up her heartbeat and tilting her stride into a sprint. Her bare footsteps slap against the hardwood, making frantic echoes.

            She skids to a stop at the end of the hall, just inside the threshold to the kitchen. Weiss stands at the sink, sipping on a glass of water until Yang’s abrupt entrance nearly makes her drop it.

            Weiss takes stock of her. Concern grows over her face. “Yang, are you alright?”

            Yang lets her set the glass on the counter, then her feet are moving three steps ahead of her heart and she’s tackling Weiss into a hug, pressing her back against the edge of the sink.

            “You’re okay.”

            Weiss winds her arms around Yang’s shoulders and squeezes tight. “I’m fine.” Her hand finds the nape of Yang’s neck, and she holds it, steadying her. “Nightmares?”

            Yang nods silently.

            “I’m sorry.”

            A fragment of the dream flickers in Yang’s mind, wrenching her stomach. _It wasn’t real,_ she chides herself. _Weiss is here. She’s right here._

            Yang folds herself closer against Weiss, tucks her face into her neck. “You’re not allowed to die,” she whispers. “You’re not.”

            For a heartbeat, Weiss seems to sink a little in her arms. But then she hugs her even tighter. “I’m not going anywhere, Yang,” she says, lips against her best friend’s ear. The feeling makes Yang shudder, but not in a bad way. Not like from the nightmares.

            “You’re stuck with me.”

            Yang wants to laugh. She really does. But all she can think about is the dream, how she let everything happen. How she stood there, frozen, and let Weiss die.

            Her breath speeds up again. She _did_ freeze. There was Haven, Cinder, a burning javelin spearing Weiss’s side. Blood, running down the perfect blue fabric of her dress. And Yang just stood there, unable to move—no fire, no rage. For those few moments she thought she’d lost Weiss, her world turned achingly cold.

            “I’m so sorry,” Yang exhales, and she feels herself begin to shake, the first tremors before tears. “I’m sorry, I—”

            Weiss leans away a little, just enough to let Yang raise up her head. To put a little breathing room between them. Still, Weiss reaches up a hand and strokes her hair, pushes flyaway strands off her face, and Yang softens because honestly, she’s forgotten how good it felt to be touched like this.

            “What in the world are you apologizing for?” Weiss asks. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”

            “I couldn’t save you.”

            Weiss scoffs. “Yang, please. You saved me from your mother, remember?”

            Yang’s brow cinches. She doesn’t really know how to process that. “Huh?”

            Weiss’s hands trail down Yang’s shoulders to grasp her arms. Idly, she runs a thumb over her bicep—Yang can tell it’s a nervous tic, but it feels...nice.

            “Wounds heal,” Weiss starts, eyes downcast, “but being sold back to my father—that would’ve been unfixable. Especially through your usual means of solving issues.”

            “I don’t know, a punch might do him some good.”

            Weiss’s face tightens, and Yang realizes now isn’t a good time for a half joke.

            “Yang, you have done more than enough rescuing,” says Weiss. She lifts a hand from Yang’s arm, only to scratch at her own neck. “I can never thank you enough for everything you’ve done for me.”

            Yang blinks a few times. She’s never thought about it like that. The way she fights, it’s never really been about rescuing damsels; her style has always been heart first, fists second. But she gets it. She’s supposed to be a Huntress, after all. And Huntresses save people like it’s instinct, a reflex.

            If that’s what it takes, then Weiss is one of the best Huntresses she’s ever known.

            “I don’t…” Yang stammers, “...I don’t think I can thank you enough for what you’ve done for me, either.”

            Finally, Weiss lifts her eyes from the floor. A weak smile, barely there, pulls at her lips, but to Yang, it’s all the confirmation she needs. Weiss is here. Weiss isn’t going anywhere. Wherever this new war takes them, it won’t be apart.

            Weiss rocks back and forth on her heels. “I guess we’ll just die in debt to each other, huh?”

            Now Yang is the one smiling. “There are worse ways to go out.”

            “We should go back to bed, now,” says Weiss. “I don’t know if you know this, but it _is_ three in the morning.”

            Weiss steps around her and Yang follows her into the hallway, hovering close.

            “You know, I saw Ren and Nora outside,” Yang says.

            “Just now?”

            “Yep.”

            “Guess they can’t sleep, either.”

            Weiss opens the door to their dorm and allows Yang inside first. They cross as far as they need to their respective beds, but neither gets back under their covers.

            “It’s so...quiet here,” Weiss mutters. Her gaze fixes not on Yang, but the gauzy curtains covering the window behind her. “I remember at Beacon, we could always hear people talking, walking around out in the halls. That feels like forever ago.”

            Yang draws her knees into her chest. “Yeah. It’s been a weird year.”

            “Hey, are you sure you’re okay now?”

            “What? Yeah, I’ll be fine.”

            Weiss lifts an eyebrow. “Are you _positive_?”

            Something in Weiss’s voice, the way her usual chiding tone edges on cautious, breaks down Yang’s last defenses.

            “No,” she whispers. It’s just loud enough for Weiss to catch.

            “Then talk to me, Yang,” Weiss says. “About the dream, about Blake. Whatever. You won’t sleep if you can’t get this off your chest.”

            “Sounds like you’re speaking from experience.”

            “Well, I think we’ve all been there at some point. Especially now.”

            Yang swings her legs over the side of the bed, pressing her palm hard into the mattress. “You grew up with a big sister, right? Winter?”

            “Yes.”

            “And when you had bad dreams in the night, or something scared you—a voice you thought you heard, a shadow you thought you saw—did you run to her? Climb into her bed because you thought just the presence of another person would drive the monsters away?”

            Weiss stiffens. Looks down at her lap. “No, we didn’t...we weren’t touchy like that.”

            Yang lets out a hollow laugh. “Ruby used to do that to me when we were kids,” she says. “Then I was home recovering, getting used to my new arm, and I was the one having nightmares. Every night I closed my eyes and it was like the world was burning, and Blake was screaming, and Adam was raising his blade, ready to cut everything away from me. With each dream he looked more and more like a monster—like some kind of human Grimm, and just before he’d strike me, I’d wake up sweating and crying but I’d have nowhere to go. No one to run to.”

            “Yang,” Weiss sighs.

            “Do you know how hard it is to have a dream like that, where you know it was _real_ , and wake up alone?”

            “I wish…” Weiss starts, “...I wish I hadn’t chosen such a bad time to get a glass of water.”

            “You’re fine, Weiss. I found you.”

            Weiss stands, smoothing the skirt of her nightgown, then crosses the space between their beds and sits down beside Yang. She lays a hand on her back, and Yang wonders if she can feel her quivering.

            Only the faintest wash of light from the shattered moon makes it around the curtains, but it’s enough to illuminate the weary smile Weiss is giving her, her ice blue eyes filled with something warm. Hope, maybe. Or assurance. Whatever it is, Yang clings to it.

            “I’ll be honest, I’m not used to anything like this, but...I can stay with you,” Weiss offers. She kicks up a leg, turning her ankle. “Though, my feet do get pretty cold.”

            This elicits a laugh from Yang—a real one. “That’s okay. I don’t think anybody’s can be colder than Ruby’s.”

            Yang crawls over to the other side of the bed and stretches out, ducking her feet under the bunched-up covers. Hesitantly, Weiss lowers herself beside her. They line up in perfect parallel, touching only at little points from their shoulders down their arms. Yang disturbs the formation only a second, just long enough to pull the covers over them.

            She doesn’t close her eyes, yet. Weiss’s presence at her side is comforting, but makes her hyper-aware at the same time. Like so much of her, it’s a paradox. Order and defiance, fire and ice—it’s only natural she’d pull Yang two different ways.

            Yang stares at the ceiling and tries to measure her breaths, using the satisfying crisscross of the beams as a lace over her thoughts. Her dad’s voice echoes in four-and-eight-counts.

            “Hey Yang,” Weiss says, and Yang’s concentration unravels.

            She doesn’t mind it entirely. “What’s up, Weiss?”

            “I’m glad you’re on my team.”

            Yang feels a smile at the corners of her lips. “Me too.”

            Then Weiss shifts on the bed, curling into Yang’s side so her nose presses into her shoulder, and finally, Yang closes her eyes.

+

            Weiss isn’t sure what time it is when she awakens to a faceful of Yang’s golden hair. She doesn’t realize that’s what it is, at first. All she feels is the heat, her own sweat clinging like dewdrops to her cheeks. She shifts closer to Yang, thinking maybe they can get away sleeping in today, that Ruby won’t burst through the door eager to get training and find them—

            —her eyes shoot open. She untangles her arm from around Yang’s waist and wrenches herself into a sitting position, wiping her sleeve across her damp face. To Weiss’s relief, her movement does nothing to stir Yang. She sleeps still as a doll, save the gentle swell and fall of her chest. Her hair fans over her back and shoulders, though it’s significantly matted where Weiss’s face had been. Every few strands catch the sunlight filtering through the curtains.

            Yang is _luminous._

            Heat spreads across Weiss’s cheeks. This is normal, right? Girls share beds at sleepovers all the time. At least Weiss thinks they do. She was never allowed to have sleepovers with her friends—if they could even be called that—as a child, but she heard plenty of stories about them, how girls would all crawl under the same blanket to talk about boys until the sun came up. For a long time, she envied them. While they were busy chasing her wealth and influence, she grew jealous of their normalcy, the lighter weights sitting on their shoulders.

 But then she lived at Beacon in a room with three other girls, always fighting for the bathroom and silence, and she figured she hadn’t missed much.

            This is different. She and Yang have done this because they needed each other: Yang because of the nightmares, and Weiss because she needed Yang to be okay. She certainly seems okay now, sleeping so peacefully.

            So why does Weiss want to stay?

            She decides to lie down again, now that Ruby isn’t knocking down the door, but makes it only onto her elbows before Yang rolls over, letting out a yawn. Weiss tries to play it cool, like she’s only just waking up herself, but then Yang pokes her side, demanding attention. There’s a mark on Yang’s cheek from where it pressed into the wrinkles on the pillowcase, and Weiss finds herself wanting to trace it.

            Yang pops one eye open. “Morning, ice queen,” she mumbles. “Know what time it is?”

            “No, I’m not sure,” Weiss says, and the sleepiness in her own voice surprises her. “Coffee?”

            “Yeah, sounds great,” she responds. With another yawn, she sits up and stretches out her arms, drawing the muscles taut. “Hey, can you hand me my arm? It’s on the nightstand.”

            “Of course.” Reluctantly, Weiss slides her legs out from under the blanket and paces over to the nightstand. Yang’s Atlesian arm is mirror-cold in her hands.

            She stands and turns. Yang is watching her study the arm, lips drawn up in a sleepy smile. For some reason, it makes Weiss feel a little funny in the legs.

            “I swear I’m still getting used to it, putting that thing on every day.”

            “Do you want help?” Weiss asks.

            Surprise stretches Yang’s face. “I...what do you mean?”

            Weiss sits back on the bed. Something warm rises in her stomach, and for now, she decides to call it confidence. “I mean I can help you put your arm on, if you want.”

            It could just be the light, but Weiss swears she spots a blush run over Yang’s cheeks, reddening the mark from the pillow. “Sure,” Yang says. She holds out her stub arm so Weiss can reach it. “It’s pretty easy, you just have to pop it into place.”

            “Okay,” Weiss exhales.

            She wraps a hand around the underside of Yang’s forearm to steady it, get the port to the precise angle. Then, tentatively, her own hands quivering around the metal, she guides the joint of the arm into the port. With a _click,_ the arm connects, and Yang wiggles her reattached fingers.

            “Thanks, Weiss,” she says, and her smile brightens, making downturned crescents of her eyes.

            For a moment, all Weiss can do is smile back, until she realizes she’s still very much holding onto Yang’s upper arm. She drops her hand into her lap and grips her wrist to keep it there. To stay in control.

            “So, you mentioned coffee?” Yang prods.

            “Yeah,” Weiss says, nodding. “Let’s go.”

+

            “Well, you two are up later than usual.”

            At the head of the kitchen table, Qrow Branwen leans far back in his chair, his legs propped lazily on the empty one beside him. It’s one of the only empty ones, Weiss notices. There are two more across from Qrow, and she and Yang take them. Nora gives Weiss a _look,_ but without any caffeine in her system, she doesn’t have the energy to decipher what it means.

            “Don’t look so startled, kids. We weren’t going to start the team meeting without you,” says Qrow. He sits up slightly, just to take a long swig of coffee. And liquor, probably. Weiss nearly shivers at the thought of how awful that must taste. Especially first thing in the morning.

            Qrow points around the table, counting them off. “And now we’re just missing...one.”

            “It’s Sun,” Blake says. She rises from her seat and tucks it under the table. “I’ll go get him up.”

            As she heads for the stairs, she passes behind Weiss and Yang, and Weiss doesn’t miss the way Yang tenses. They were fine when Blake first arrived, but the wait for news from Ironwood has given them all too much time to think—and for Yang, that means time to rekindle her anger. Not that it isn’t justified. Weiss knows Yang has been abandoned more times than any of them; what Blake did only tore open an already thinly sutured wound.

            Weiss knows they’ll mend things, though. They love each other. They _all_ love each other. And whatever comes next, whatever awaits them in the icy stronghold of Atlas, they’ll be ready to face it together.

            It’s an idealistic thought, but it’s comforting. Weiss holds it close.

            “Hey Weiss,” Ruby chirps, breaking Weiss from her reverie.  

            Weiss turns. Ruby hovers right beside her, hands already moving for her ponytail.

            “What are you doing, Ruby?”

            “Fixing your bedhead,” she says. She jabs her fingers into her hair, then starts working it, surprisingly gently, out of the ponytail. “You look like you slept in a headstand.”

            “Well, you can blame your sister for that.”

            Ruby’s hands stop. Mouths gape all around the table. Qrow gives her a wink. Weiss is confused, at first, but when she realizes just what she’s admitted, a blush explodes over her face.

            “You all are terrible,” she sputters, crossing her arms. “I meant her _snoring_ kept me up all night—I was tossing and turning until sunrise!”

            Everyone erupts into giggles. Weiss glances at Yang, expecting to see her bowled over laughing like the others. Instead, she seems stiff, her gaze fastened to the spot where Ruby’s fingers tangle in Weiss’s hair.

            “You okay?”

            “Yeah,” Yang says. It comes out flat. “Ruby, you almost done there?”

            Ruby, still giggling, tries to nod. “Yep! Working on it.”

            Yang sets her focus on her lap while Ruby finishes redoing Weiss’s ponytail. It’s far from perfect, and definitely not to her liking, but she guesses it’s better than her cuddle-induced bedhead.

            She’ll have to be more careful, next time. Assuming there is one.

            Once she shoos Ruby back to her seat, she steals a glance at Yang. None of her tension has eased since Blake passed behind her. Her real hand quivers in her lap.

            Weiss considers her own hands. It wouldn’t be weird to take Yang’s, right? I mean, she did sleep in Yang’s bed last night. Why is she being so awkward about this?

            She makes sure Qrow is looking elsewhere before stretching her arm and closing her fingers over Yang’s shaking hand. Yang curls her fingers around hers, a silent thank-you, and Weiss catches her small, grateful smile in her periphery.

            Blake reenters the kitchen, pulling Sun along by his sleeve. Yang doesn’t turn around.

            “Hey, look what the cat dragged in,” Nora chirps.

            Everyone groans, but none more loudly than Blake.

            “You all are worse than my old Signal kids,” Qrow whines, but it’s tinged with endearment. He moves his legs off the empty chair, straightens his back. “Sit down. We’ve got a lot to cover.”

            Blake and Sun take their seats. Sun, still half-asleep, leans his face into his palm.

            “Here’s the deal,” Qrow starts. “One week, and a ship will be at the ports to take us to Atlas. That means one more week to get ourselves together, back into fighting shape.”

            Now Weiss is the one to tense up. She’s known this. Qrow told them they were going to Atlas just hours after the Battle of Haven. But at least then, the delay was indefinite. Weiss had _time._ To her, a week feels impossibly short. She feels goosebumps pucker her skin, but she’s not sure whether they come from fear, or the memory of the cold.

            “Atlas Academy is secure, military-protected on all fronts,” Qrow continues. “Ironwood has assured me you’ll be safe there. It’s just getting there that’s the hard part.”

            Weiss isn’t so sure. She knows Atlas Academy protocols, from all the times her father and Ironwood tried to push her that way—they catalog everything. The second she steps through the doors, her father will know she’s back in his territory. And she can already see him standing there in the Academy’s gunmetal halls, ordering her to come home, to leave behind her friends and her mission for his.

            The pressure on her fingers tightens. Yang knows, better than anyone, how much she dreads going home.

            Winter could be there, though. The bandits in Raven’s tribe, they told her all the Atlas specialists had been recalled. If Ironwood could ensure that Winter got to see her first, instead of her father...

            Her sister’s voice sounds in her mind, frosting over her hope. _I’m not always going to be around to save you, Weiss._

            Maybe she won’t. But Weiss is getting stronger now. And this time, she won’t have to face her father alone.

+

            Rain moves into Mistral after the sun sets, turning the earth cool and damp while city lights set the clouds aflame. Weiss watches them from her perch at the bedroom window, her cheek laid lazily against the glass. She’ll move eventually, get ready for bed, but for the moment, it’s too much effort. Qrow worked them all to the bone in training today, and even this long after Jaune healed her, Weiss can still feel tiny pinpricks of pain in her ribcage, emanating from the spot where Cinder’s javelin speared her. Though she can’t see it beneath the new wrap that circles her waist, hiding the two fresh holes in her favorite dress, she knows there’s a scar there, pink and jagged. The scar beneath her eye used to look the same. Only she tries not to keep running her finger over the new one, as if enough pressure might iron it out.

            Twin holes, twin scars—even her imperfections have found an order.

            The bathroom door swings open. Yang steps out, hair freshly dried and floating over her shoulders.

            “All yours,” she says, then gingerly heads over to her bed.

            Weiss grabs her nightgown off the dresser and ducks inside the bathroom. She tries not to look at herself, at the scars, as she changes, and lucky for her, the dorm mirror is tiny, positioned so high above the sink it only captures her from the shoulders up.

            Still, as she adjusts the straps on her nightgown, the mirror pulls her in. She counts her scar (one), the rings of blue beneath her eyes (two, though with her sleeping habits, they’ve been growing outer arms), and the scabbed-over remnants of biting her lower lip (a perfect constellation of three).

 _You’re making such a mess,_ her father echoes through the mirror.

            She wants to ignore it, squeeze her eyes tight and block it out, but she can’t. The mirror beckons, and she bows. Her glyphs, her creatures, her blood—all she does is make messes of the battlefield. How did she think she could stand up to Cinder like this? How can she stand up to _Salem?_

            The thought pulls a sigh of defeat through her lips. She angles away from the mirror to retie her hair, then returns to the room, starching her face into something calm.

            Yang, sitting cross-legged on her bed, offers her a smile. She’s got her flesh arm clamped around the Atlas one, index finger poised over a latch. With the smallest twitch of her finger, she releases the arm gently from its port and lays it on the nightstand.

            “I think my arm’s been acting up,” she says. “There’s been some funky twitching in the fingers ever since Mercury got his hands on it.”

            Weiss starts towards her own bed. “You know he totally deserved it, by the way.”

            “Deserved what?”

            “When you broke his leg at the Vytal Festival Tournament.” Weiss sits down on the edge of her bed. “We were all shocked when it happened, because we didn’t know the truth—that it was Emerald the whole time, manipulating us with her crazy illusions—but he definitely had it coming.”

            Yang lets her face fall to her lap. “I...thanks, Weiss.”

            The last illusion Emerald left them—Salem, with her red eyes wreathed in shadowed veins—surfaces in Weiss’s mind, and a sharp burst of fear quickens her pulse.

            “I think if I have any nightmares tonight, they’ll probably be about her.”

            Yang’s brow tightens. “Who, Emerald? Why?”

            “Not Emerald. Salem. The vision. We all saw her. That’s what we’re up against, now. This is all so much bigger than we thought.”

            “Yeah, it’s...it’s a lot to think about,” Yang replies. She picks at the hem of her sleep shorts. “Which is why I am going to go to bed and hope that I can stop thinking. At least for a little while.”

            Yang turns down her covers and reclines across the mattress. She stretches, arching her back and pressing down her hips, and Weiss, in her efforts to _not_ stare at Yang, lets her gaze settle on the empty swath of sheets beside her.

            “Do you want company again tonight?” Weiss blurts.

            Heat bubbles up her neck, over her cheeks. She hadn’t meant to say that aloud. At least not yet. But Yang inclines her head, just enough to look Weiss in the eyes as she nods, quickly.

            “Yeah. That’d be nice.”

            Weiss crosses to her bed, and Yang shifts an inch towards the window, just to give her a little more room. When she lays down, Yang pulls the blankets over both of them before flopping back onto the pillow and curling closer into Weiss’s side, seeking her warmth.

            “Could you get the light?” she mumbles, mouth half-covered by the pillow.

            Weiss leans over the nightstand and tugs down the lamp’s cord. With the lights reflecting orange on the clouds outside the window, the sudden darkness is incomplete. Like it’s burning. Yang must find it comfortable, because mere minutes pass before she’s asleep, her shallow breaths rushing over Weiss’s shoulder.

            But Weiss, bending back to her thoughts, lets the darkness go cold. Atlas looms in the bedroom’s shadows, its chill seeping into the air, reaching for her. In less than a month, it will be real. She’ll be standing on its shores, staring into the mountains, feeling that bitter wind raking through her hair.

            How long, from that moment, will it take for her father to find her?

            She won’t let him take her back. Her life is her own, now—she’s fought too hard for it, nearly had it ripped out of her hands. Weiss has shouldered more hardship in a year than Jacques Schnee has in all of his life. Who is he to demand her of anything?

            Weiss makes a promise to herself, to the ceiling, to Yang’s sleeping form beside her, that if she sees him, she will meet him with defiance. Atlas is her destination, but those cold walls aren’t her home anymore. Coming home should be something _warm._

            Yang rolls over, right into Weiss’s side. “You asleep yet, ice queen?” she mumbles.

            “No.”

            “Weiss, you’re shivering,” she says, and even Weiss hasn’t noticed. Yang grabs the blanket, tugging it up to her throat. “Here, do you want more of the blanket?”

            “I’m fine.”

            Yang sits up a bit, shaking her hair out of her face. “Talk to me, then, if you can’t sleep. What’s on your mind?”

            “Just thinking, Yang,” she says, and crosses her arms over her chest, making herself small.

            “About?”

            Weiss blows a sigh. “Atlas.”

            “You’re afraid to go back.”

            “I mean, I did spend a lot of time and effort getting away from there,” she starts. “I guess I just didn’t expect to be going back so soon.”

            “You know, you can still take me up on the offer to punch your dad.”

            Weiss can’t restrain a laugh. “I appreciate it, Yang, but…”

            “That’s your battle to fight, I know.”

            “I mean, I won’t say I didn’t have a few words in mind for Raven, when we were at her camp...”

            “Wow,” Yang mutters. “Who would’ve thought shitty parents would bring us so close together?”

            They both laugh at that one.

            Weiss settles deeper into the mattress, finally accepting Yang’s offer for more of the blanket. She’s...comfortable. Yang there at her side, forehead now just brushing her shoulder, is a feeling she didn’t know she wanted. Maybe _needed_.

            “Hey Yang,” she says, a notch above a whisper.

            “What’s up, ice queen?”

            “We should visit your house on Patch, when this is all over.”

            Yang’s sigh feathers over her arm. “You miss my dog?”

            “I miss your dog.”

            She feels Yang rip the pillow out from under her, sending her head jolting back. She lets out a yelp, but it’s muffled when Yang hits her—gently—over the nose with the pillow.

            Weiss tumbles out of the bed and sets her legs into a fighting stance. “Oh, you have crossed a line, Yang Xiao Long.”

            She leans behind her and grabs the pillow from her bed. Yang tries to duck, but Weiss gets her right in the shoulder. Yang retaliates. Giggles bubbling between them, they go back and forth until Yang gets Weiss hard in the chest, knocking her back onto her bed. Yang tries to claim a victory, but Weiss pulls Yang down with her. She lands halfway on top of her, one leg laced between the two of hers.

            Weiss feels her breath catch in her throat. Fever runs over her face. Yang is still laughing, eyes blissfully closed, but all Weiss can do is watch her, seized by some strange feeling, warm and fluttering, that makes her intensely aware of every place their bodies touch. When Yang leans away and stands, Weiss finds herself missing the weight of her.

            She holds out her hand. “Here, Weiss,” she says, and there’s a gentle rasp to her voice that catches Weiss off guard. “Come back to bed before we wake everybody up.”

            Weiss takes Yang’s hand and lets her lead her back to the bed, though this time, Weiss is the one to draw up the covers as Yang situates herself, finding a comfortable spot for her head on Weiss’s shoulder. Weiss doesn’t mind. She leans into her, lets her hair tickle her cheek.

            Breathing in syncopation, they ease into silence, and it isn’t until Weiss is teetering on the edge of sleep that Yang breaks it.

            “Don’t forget what I said, okay?” she whispers. “I’m here for you.”

            “I’m here for you, too,” Weiss parrots. It means, _I’ll steady you._ It means, _I’ll be your soldier when you’ve lost the strength to fight._

            Weiss rolls onto her side, and they settle into one another.

            It’s an even fit.

+

            Yang stands covered in white. She does her best to brush it off her pants, her shirt, but it just sticks to new places, surprisingly tacky for something so soft. She can only imagine how much is clinging to her hair.

            Ren generally has good ideas, but ten teenagers making pancakes together has definitely not been one of them.

            Directly across the kitchen, Jaune has his hands clamped on either side of his head, eyes wide. “We are wasting so. Much. Flour.”

            “Relax, Jaune,” Nora chirps. She dusts a layer of flour from her skirt, and it puffs up in a cloud. “It’s not like we paid for it.”

            “Although we probably _should_ get more, if we still want to eat today,” says Ren. He looks sorely disappointed in all of them, like a parent whose children have just colored all over the walls. Yang imagines it’s just the first taste of the scolding they’ll get from her Uncle later, if they don’t clean up this mess.

            But Weiss seems to be enjoying herself—even if she burned all three of her early attempts. A smile breaks apart her lips, flour laying on her cheeks like a white blush.

            “Hey Yang, want to help me wash these bowls?” she asks with a wave of the spoon in her hand.

            “Sure.”

            Yang joins Weiss at the sink. Weiss runs the water, guides the spoon into the flow, while Yang dips a hand into the flour-filled bowl. Playfully, she draws a line of slightly damp flour down the side of Weiss’s arm.

            Weiss jerks her head. Glowers at her. With a flick of her spoon, water sprays in Yang’s face. Yang winces, then moves for another glob of flour, but Weiss is faster. She tracks a line of it down Yang’s cheek, over her lip.

            “Gross!” she exclaims.

            “You started it.”

            A beat of silence passes, and they burst into laughter.

            “Okay, but you actually have to help me, now,” Weiss says, insistent.

            “Yeah, yeah. I’ve got you.”

            Grabbing the bowl, Yang moves in beside Weiss at the sink. Yang bumps her hip—very intentionally—which gets another laugh out of her before they get to work, washing and drying the dishes as the others pile them up.

            Somehow, by the end of it, Yang forgets to wash the flour off her cheek.

+

            The Mistral City Market, with its brightly-patterned tents and banners, sprawls over three tiers of mountainside, giving it the appearance of a fountain overflowing with color. Their flock of ten descends into it, Yang hovering at the back of the procession. They’re just looking for flour, maybe a few things that could be useful on the journey to Atlas, if they find them, but as they come under the cover of the highest tents, Yang realizes this will be no quick grocery run. The inside of the Market is a labyrinth. A single tent packs rows upon rows of shops, partitioned by narrow walkways crowded with Mistrali citizens. They travel in slow-moving clusters, filling their baskets as vendors thrust their wares at them, eager to make their next sale.

            When Yang dreamed of travelling the world as a Huntress, this was the kind of sight she imagined. Places where people from all walks of life could learn and explore, where hundreds of stories converged. Unfortunately for Yang, that convergence now comes with the threat of danger—commotion is an easy mask for an enemy.

            She thinks about the Relic, back at the Academy. It’s safe with Uncle Qrow, she assures herself. No one here should know it was ever in her hands.

            “Pastries! Fresh, warm pastries!” a woman calls, voice ringing close to Yang’s ear.

            She turns, holding up a hand to say _I’ll pass,_ but she can’t ignore the way her stomach gurgles at the sight of flaky bread and frosting. _Maybe we should just skip the pancakes and get something here._

            As they pass into the next tent, Yang moves up through the flock, falling into step with Weiss. Ruby and Blake walk just ahead of them. Ruby’s hands are flying wildly—she’s clearly telling a story, but her words are lost to the din.

            “You think we cleaned up enough for your Uncle?” Weiss asks Yang.

            “Well, unless he’s going to check for flour between the floorboards, I think we’ll be alright,” she responds.

            Weiss gives her ponytail a toss. “Looks like our teammates are getting along.”

            “I’d say Ruby’s putting in most of the work.”

            Ruby, as if on cue, grabs Blake by the shoulder and points to a nearby stall. “Look, Blake. Catnip!”

            Blake bristles, but shows no sign of wanting to leave Ruby’s side. Yang finds it odd. Since she’s been back, she’s mostly stuck with Sun and Ilia. But now she’s here. Yang figures at least one of them got through to her, convinced her that team re-bonding goes both ways.

            Pain echoes in Yang’s chest. Blake is right in front of her, but they still have such a far distance to cross in terms of being on the mend. No, Yang never understood what she went through. But that’s because she wouldn’t let her. Wouldn’t open up. Yang was ready, waiting, and when she needed her the most, she turned away.

            Still, Yang loves her. She doesn’t think she’s _in love_ with her, anymore—she doesn’t think she can be. Once, her father told her about the heart closing doors, and Blake’s, at least in _that_ way, has closed in Yang’s. But she loves her, as her partner and her friend, and she supposes one of these days, she’ll gather up the courage to try to pull Blake back into their orbit.

            For now, she’s content to let Ruby be the brave one.

            “Oh Yang, look at these!”

            Weiss’s high-pitched squeal cuts Yang away from her thoughts. She’s showing off a pair of gold and purple earrings, shaped like bloated teardrops. Before Yang can weigh in, Weiss darts to the mirror on the jeweler’s counter and holds the earrings up to her ears. Her smile gleams.

            Yang steps forward, and her reflection appears in the mirror beside her. “I like those.”

            “You do?” Weiss coos, twisting over her shoulder.

            “Hey guys, come over here!” Ruby calls from the other end of the counter. She and Blake are positioned in front of a shiny display of necklaces and bangles.

            Weiss sets the earrings down and Yang grabs her hand, leading her over to their teammates. Yang forgets to let go when they’ve stopped, but Weiss doesn’t seem to mind. They keep their fingers locked as Ruby points out one of the simple bracelets.

            “Ladies, we need friendship bracelets,” she declares. “We are back together as a team. We have to _bond._ And as your team leader, I think a few shiny little reminders of our _need to bond_ are an excellent way to start.”

            “You can get whatever color stones you’d like,” sounds a woman’s voice. The shopkeep, cloaked in vibrant purple silk, saunters up to the counter from her chair. “But you’ll have to pick between silver and gold for the bands.”

            “Well, I personally like silver,” Ruby offers. “I’d say it matches best with our outfits.” With a brush of her hands, she flounces her skirt as if to prove it.

            “And your eyes,” Blake adds.

            “Oh, yeah. That too.”

            Blake shrugs. “It’s got my vote.”

            “Come on, guys. Gold is so much prettier,” Yang argues. “And silver screams runners-up. We want to be winners, right?”

            Blake lifts an eyebrow. “What about you, Weiss? Silver, or gold?”

            Yang braces herself with a frown. It’s hardly a serious argument, but she knows it’ll be three-against-one. Ruby, batting her eyelashes at Weiss, seems to think the same. Of course Weiss will choose silver. She’s already wearing it.

            But then Weiss turns to Yang with a smile, brushing her thumb down to tap Yang’s wrist, and says, “Gold. I like gold.”

            Yang, her stomach suddenly fluttery, greets her decision with a wink.

            Ruby groans. “Great. Now we have to get a tiebreaker.”

            Musical laughter rings nearby. “I don’t care what color you get,” the shopkeep volunteers. She stands a display over, rearranging the necklaces Ruby mussed. “So long as you pay for it.”

            Yang glances around, hoping to spot a glimpse of their friends among the sea of strangers. A few booths down the row, she catches a flash of Nora’s red hair, Ren following like a shadow. Yang cups her free hand around her mouth.

            “HEY NORA!”

            Nora wheels around. Waves. Yang beckons her over, and she drags Ren with her by the sleeve.

            “Yo, what’s up? You guys find any flour?” she asks.

            “No, but we need your help,” Ruby says.

            Nora nods, assessing them. Her eyes rivet to Yang’s hand, still clasping Weiss’s, and her bubbly smile thins into a smirk. Yang gives her a look that says _I see you,_ but she has no interest in letting go of Weiss’s hand.

            “Well how can Judge Nora be of service?” Nora asks.

            “We need you to break a tie,” Ruby explains. “Weiss and Yang want gold friendship bracelets, me and Blake want silver. And don’t say we can all get different ones—this is for _team bonding._ They have to be the same.”

            Deliberating, Nora taps a finger to her chin. She gives them each a once-over, but announces her decision with her gaze on Yang and Weiss.

            “Gold,” she says. “You should go with gold.”

+

            On the walk home, Yang releases Weiss’s hand to fiddle with her bracelet. The gold glimmers, but brighter are the four paste jewels set across the center in a perfect line: red, white, black, yellow.

            It’s funny, Yang thinks, because their team walks—though still four across—in a different formation. Instead of at the far end, Yang finds herself between Blake and Weiss. The girls who came back to her—and in their own ways, have promised to stay.

            Yang needs the both of them. Differently, for sure. But she needs them. War looms closer as the days pass under their feet, and Team RWBY has to be ready to fight, just like in their Beacon days.

            If only things had remained so simple. Yang daydreams about that, sometimes. What it would’ve been like to train their full tenure at Beacon, graduating as professional Huntresses instead of being thrust into the fray as first-years. Maybe it wouldn’t scare her so much, knowing just touching that Relic has made her a target.

            But then she remembers her father’s team. Her mother’s. Team STRQ graduated Beacon at the top of their class, but it wasn’t long after before they splintered.

            Perhaps the chaos, then, will keep Team RWBY together.

            _Let there be peace, too,_ Yang wishes, if selfishly. _Give us some room to breathe._

            Then she turns her face to Weiss. Her gaze is pointed forward, into the curls of mist rising through the mountains. The sun glints silver in her hair, gold around her wrist. Really, everything about her shines.

            Weiss, sensing Yang’s eyes on her, lets her head drift. She meets Yang with a soft smile, close-lipped and hopeful, and Yang returns it.

            For now, peace may elude them. But maybe there are brighter things to be found.

+

            Laying next to Yang is peaceful, Weiss thinks. Like watching the sunset, like singing. Yang’s gentle breathing sounds more like a lullaby—so much different than the fearful, gasping breaths from nights before. Weiss is so glad she’s able to offer what little comfort she has given. If she’s being honest with herself she isn’t entirely sure how or when or why she became so important to Yang—she briefly thinks it may have been when she reached up and held her hand at Raven’s camp—but it’s...nice. She’s not used to being someone’s pillar, someone’s safe haven—she’s not really sure she’s cut out for it.

            Yang snores lightly and Weiss decides that it doesn’t matter; she’s going to give this girl her all.

            She almost falls asleep again before she remembers the downside of sleeping next a human heater. Bringing a hand up to rub at her sore throat, she sits up, spares a glance at Yang. She leans over her and brushes some of the tangled mass of hair sprawled over the pillows back into place. When Yang doesn’t stir, Weiss deems it safe to get a glass of water. She stands and the floor beneath her creaks, and the bed dips slightly with the weight of her gone. Yang curls into herself tighter. _I’ll bring it back with me,_ she decides.

            She briefly considers leaving a note—a failsafe in case Yang wakes up again, searching for a body that isn’t there—but decides it’d take her too long and tiptoes into the hallway. She shuts the door behind her soundlessly and slips away, her feet barely whisper against the hardwood. She’s had plenty of practice being silent. Atlas was known for silencing people. _It’s not ladylike to be so loud, Weiss_ , a voice whispers, _be too loud and I’ll shut your mouth for you_.

            A chill shoots up her spine ( _Like a slap_ , the voice whispers, _think it’ll bruise?_ ) and she suddenly desperately misses Yang’s warmth. Her pace quickens.

            She steps into the light of the kitchen and is surprised to find she is not alone.

            Nora is seated on one of the stools by the island, balancing precariously. The steady back and forth rocking only makes the vacant stare on her face feel more out of place. _Sit up straight, Weiss, do you need another lesson?_

            She shakes the voice away, “Nora?”

            Nora blinks twice and then comes back from whatever world she drifted to. Her gaze goes from vacant to laser focused in an instant, and then she’s grinning like a cat ready to pounce, “Hiya, Ice Queen.”

            “What are you doing up?” Weiss asks—more out of politeness than anything. She loves Nora, really, but it’s two in the morning and she still misses Yang. She opens the cabinet and grabs a glass.

            “Nothing.” Nora says. Weiss hums, places one, two, three, four— _you’re taking too long, Weiss—five_ ice cubes in her glass and fills it with water. Nora asks, “What are _you_ doing up so late, hm?”

            Weiss ignores the churning in her stomach. _Bed time, Weiss_. She turns back from the sink to face Nora, sips her water, “Getting a drink.” she says.

            She swears she hears a crackle like lightning when Nora smiles in response. “Yeah?” she asks, “And what’s gotten you so thirsty?”

            Weiss’ brow scrunches together and she takes another sip of her water, leaning back against the counter. Nora tilts her head inquisitively, lightning-carved smirk still in place. Weiss sighs, “I have no idea what you’re trying to insinuate—“

            “—that—“

            “—and I’m really too tired to deal with it.”

            _That was rude, Weiss, out of turn, out of line. Speak like that again and I’ll break your jaw_ —she takes another sip of her drink. Nora’s face scrunches up like it does when she’s curious, “You okay?” She asks. Weiss taps her fingers one, two, three times against her glass and then nods, “Yeah, I’m fine. Why did you say you were up?”

            “Oh, I’ve just made a few observations, Ice Queen,” a dangerous statement, “Which is definitely something I can do.”

            Weiss hums, she’s never doubted Nora’s ability to be subversive when she sees fit, “I saw you hit Ren with a notebook the other day.”

            “He needs to learn to mind his own business—I will share my discoveries with him when I feel like it,” She claps her hands together, Weiss thinks for a second that thunder roars, “Anyway. Who cares about him right now. I mean, I do, but he is not the focus of my theory. _You_ are, however.”

            Weiss has never been afraid of Nora, but she feels the hair on her arms and the back of her neck stand on end, like the moment before lightning strikes, “Me? What about me?”

            Nora laughs—quieter than her usual boisterous howl but still loud enough to make Weiss’s head ring. The voice comes back, more insistent: This _is the company you keep? No, no this is unacceptable, Weiss. You cut them off, or I’ll tear you from them._ Weiss brings the glass back to her lips almost subconsciously and it snaps her back into the moment. She takes a sip, forces the knot in her throat back down. _Shut up_ , she thinks, _Nora’s speaking_.

            Nora leans across the counter dramatically, arms outstretched. She smirks up at Weiss, “Let’s just say I think I figured out what went and warmed you up.”

            Weiss’s shoulders shoot up and her face goes a bright red. Nora almost hits her head on the counter when she bends down to grip her stomach and laugh at the expression. Weiss grips the glass in her hand and glares, “I _will_ pour this on you and ice _does_ burn.”

            “From what I’ve seen, _Weiss_ melts.”

            “Nora.”

            “Oh, c’mon! Don’t think I haven’t noticed!” Nora exclaims, “it’s so obvious!”

            Weiss knows she shouldn’t ask for her to clarify, but she does anyway, “What is oh so obvious, Nora? Other than your affection for Ren.” She smirks and this time Nora goes red, but she swiftly recovers and the smile she sends Weiss’s way has turned borderline frightening.

            “ _Your_ affection for Yang.”

            Weiss starts, “My what?”

            Nora leans back and tilts her head to the ceiling. Story time, apparently, “Y’know, at first I didn’t think much of it. You two had been through a lot and now that you were back together obviously you’d want to spend some time together. That much made sense.” Nora brings her head back down, “But you picked _gold_ for those bracelets.”

            Weiss lets out some frustrated sound and looks to the clock hanging over the dining room table behind Nora. She needs to get back to Yang. “What’s your point?”

            Nora continues on as if she hadn’t spoken at all. _Good, stay invisible._ “You picked gold. You two were holding hands at breakfast _and_ in the market—you’re really not at all subtle, by the way—you both have been inseparable lately.” Nora takes in a breath, “Is it really so much of a stretch for me to believe Little Miss Ice Queen has gone and gotten her heart melted?”

            Weiss taps her foot against the tiled floor of the kitchen. _It better be_ , the voice insists, _You’re mine._ Weiss shakes her head. _Always._ She looks back to the clock. 2:13. She’s been gone far too long. _Far too long, Weiss. I’ll take her. She won’t be there when you get back_. “Okay, Nora, that’s enough. I’m going back to sleep.”

            She turns to step back into the hallway before Nora’s arm is suddenly at her elbow, halting her steps. Her heel squeaks against the tile and her heart lurches, _too loud, I”ll find you, Weiss. I’ll find you_ “Weiss,”

            Nora’s lighthearted playfulness has been replaced by that vacant, sad thing from earlier. Nora’s fingers curl around her forearm and a part of Weiss is grateful for the grounding touch. The other part is scared of bruising. “Weiss, listen,” she pleads, and she does, because she’s never seen Nora like this before.

            “You always find someone you can’t live without, but sometimes you don’t _realize_ that until it’s too late—“ _Too late, Weiss, too late_ , “—don’t be too late. Please?”

            Weiss switches the glass from her right hand to her left when she feels her fingers go numb. _What’s she even_ mean, Weiss thinks, but Nora’s eyes are still trained on her so she nods, “Alright, Nora. I promise.”

Nora studies her for a few more long seconds before nodding and releasing her, “I just want you all to be happy,” She says quietly, and it feels to Weiss like all the ferocity of the storm that she has always envisioned around Nora has been replaced by something dreadfully cold and fragile. It’s familiar in a way that terrifies her. Nora forces a tired smile, “That’s all.”

            This time, it’s Weiss who reaches out ( _how dare you touch that_ thing, that voice screams). Her hand lands on Nora’s shoulder and squeezes, “I want you to be happy, too, Nora.” She says, her smile weighed down by her fatigue but no less sincere. She lets her hand fall, “Get some rest, okay?”

            Nora nods and shoots her a grateful smile—to Weiss’s joy there is a touch of lightning back in it—and then pads into the hallway and to the room she and Ruby share. Weiss takes one more look at the clock and then makes her way back to her and Yang’s room just as silently as she had left it.

            She reaches for the door knob and the voice—her father’s voice—slams back into her head with the force of a sledgehammer. _She isn’t there, Weiss,_ he says _, you’re next_. Her breath turns shallow and quick, her hand trembling just before the door. _She’ll be there_ , she tells herself, _she always is_.

_Are you sure?_

            The glass in her left hand is dripping condensation onto the floor now, but no longer can Weiss bring herself to open that door. Her hand is shaking so much she’s not sure she’d have the grip in the first place. Chills creep up her arms and goosebumps pucker her skin in their wake. It's so _cold_. She feels like she’s suffocating ( _You have to hold that note for longer, Weiss.)_

_Are you sure?_

            No, she isn’t, but she thinks if she stays out here any longer she’ll freeze to death. Her fingers wrap around the door knob and find the strength to twist.

_Are you sure?_

            Yang snores and, yeah, Weiss is sure.

            The minute she sees Yang a warmth settles and brushes the cold off her shoulders. She shuts the door behind her, less worried now about the sound she makes. Yang was always a heavy sleeper back at Beacon, she recalls, but it’s less that she’s afraid of waking her and more that she knows if her father (or the ghost of her father’s voice) comes chasing after her for being too loud Yang would be there.

            If Weiss is being truthful, she’s always been that way. Yang was never hesitant with her like the others were. Weiss makes her way to the edge of their (is it _their_ now? That sounds a bit forward) bed and peels the covers back carefully. Yang’s hair is all over her face from where she turned over, now facing her, and gently, Weiss smooths it out across the pillow.

            Weiss finds herself holding her breath. Yang is so _beautiful_. Even in her sleep there is a quiet strength about her, something stitched into the freckles peppering her cheeks and the golden glow of her hair. Light doesn’t so much shine on her as burn within her.

            Why would anyone ever want to leave her?

            Weiss can’t fathom it—can’t comprehend a world without the light Yang provides. If Weiss lost Yang, she thinks she’d stop seeing her colors in the world. The golds of autumn, the olives weaving the ground beneath her feet, the soft violet smudges of the clouds at twilight—all of them would fade to gray.

            She doesn’t notice that her hand has come to rest and cup Yang’s cheek until Yang moves, nose pressing softly against her palm. She freezes, shocked at herself, and then pulls back slowly.

            Nora’s voice rings in her head.

            _You picked gold for those bracelets_.

            _Your affection for Yang._

            _Oh_.

            Weiss lays down stiffly, shoulders tense.

            She…supposes this makes sense. It’s not like she was blind to how attractive Yang was, she’s always been gorgeous. That isn’t the problem, Weiss can easily admit that much.

            The problem is she doesn’t know how to _feel_ like this.

            Atlas and her father—she supposes at this point they are very much one and the same—taught her to be cold and cautious. Her feelings (if she can call them that, already they feel microscopically small in comparison for what she feels next to Yang) for Neptune were based off of what she was taught to look for.

            Handsome, charismatic, and wealthy—his jacket had cost about as much as her boots—he was the perfect candidate. And best of all, other than his more-than-occasional obnoxiousness, he reminded her nothing of her father.

            Until now, that’s what love meant to her.

            Being with Neptune, she recalls, felt fast. Like sneaking out of the manor at night to play in the snow as a kid, like chasing Atlas’ military grade mechs in the middle of downtown vale. It felt temporary.

            Yang doesn’t feel temporary.

            Yang shifts so her nose is pressing into Weiss’s shoulder and the contact snaps her out of her thoughts. She turns to look at her. They’re so close her lips brush Yang’s forehead with the movement and red smears across Weiss’s cheeks. She turns to her side slowly, careful not to disturb her but desperate for a little more breathing room.

            It doesn’t help much. At all. Now Weiss just has a clearer view of her and the sight of her this close almost leaves her breathless.

            She finds herself wanting to trace constellations within the freckles on her cheeks, to tangle her fingers in sunlight-woven hair, she wants to lean down and kiss her. Her hand falls on Yang’s bicep, right above the port for her prosthetic, and her thumb runs up and to her shoulder, her collarbone, her jaw, over full, downturned lips, and then cups her cheek again.

            She settles, runs her thumb idly back and forth across Yang’s cheek, and scoots closer. Yang exhales and now they’re so close that Weiss can feel it on her own lips and it makes her shiver in a way entirely different than the cold had. Her hand traces its way back to Yang’s shoulder and tugs her in as softly as possible. Then she’s leaning in, tilting Yang’s head up slightly, and plants a kiss on Yang’s forehead.

            _Okay_ , she thinks, settling down again, keeps her arm thrown over Yang’s shoulder. _Okay_.

            She shifts closer one last time and finally allows sleep to take her.

+

            This time, there is fire along with the blood.

            It dances along her arms and spirals from her hair in embers and swirls in the red of her eyes, burns her footsteps into the ground. Adam Taurus stands opposite her, smirking. Blood drips from the markings in his mask and the red of his hair, falls against his unsheathed blade and trails the length of it—directly onto Blake Belladonna’s bleeding stomach.

            Adam looks to her and grins, lips stretching into something terrifying and hungry. He looks back to Blake, her face more fearful than Yang has ever seen it, and says, “Starting with her.”

            Yang moves to take a step and finds herself stuck. Her gaze shoots down to her feet for no more than a second and then Adam is behind her. All the fire and anger sputters out and she chokes on the fear that slithers in in place of it. He smiles and this close Yang sees that his teeth are sharp, like a shark’s—like a Grimm’s. He laughs, a wretched, dark sound, and swings his blade. Yang closes her eyes as he closes in—

            —and then Yang is on the ground and Blake is on top of her, guarding her, and Adam’s smile falls. Yang tries to reach out to Blake with an arm that isn’t there and instead falls to the ground. She tries to scream, but either nothing comes out or Blake doesn’t hear her. He walks over, swings the rest of Blake’s blood off of his blade, and shakes his head as if disappointed, “Why must you hurt me like this, Blake?”

            Blake bares her teeth and curls more protectively over her. Adam swings and Yang reaches out one last desperate time. Her hand meets and buries itself in shadow, black tendrils curling into the air and disappearing. Yang watches them go, looks back to her outstretched hand and thinks it’s like she was never there at all.

            “She left you.”

            Adam’s sword still drips with blood as he turns his attention directly to her. He cackles, and now Yang notices that his mask isn’t so much sitting on his face as it is melded into it, still bleeding from the markings. His skin is darker, almost gray and peeling off in patches revealing pitch black viens crossing over and through him like spider webs. “How’s it feel?”

            He crouches in front of her, bones cracking. Yang shakes her head, “S-Stop—“

            The tip of his sword meets the tip of her nose, and the blood on the end smells like rot. She freezes, he grins, “We really aren’t so different, you know.”

            She shakes her head again, eyes welling up, but no sound coming out. He tilts his head, hungry smile still in place, “We’re,” he laughs and slices into the skin on Yang’s cheek, “ _cut_ from the same cloth—“

            “ _Get away from her!_ ”

            Just as quickly as Blake disappeared, Weiss appears. A black glyph sprouts from beneath Adam’s feet and shoots him in the other direction. Weiss shoots forward to stand in front of Yang, sword poised in Adam’s direction as he climbs to his feet again.

            For whatever reason, this time when Yang speaks, it reaches her, “ _Weiss_! What are you doing!? Get out of here!”

            Weiss looks over her shoulder at Yang and smiles, “I’m not leaving you.”

            Her voice comes out soft, as if she were far away and not right in front of her. Like this was more memory than dream. “Weiss—“

            “ _Finally_ ,” their attention shoots to Adam as he regains his balance. There’s blood dripping over his teeth now, his hands and forearms a pitch black, oily mess. He licks his lips and blood smears, “ _I get to kill a Schnee_.”

Weiss squares her shoulders, tilts her head up, and places her right foot forward, “You’re not the first to say that.”

            Yang manages to scramble to her feet and grip Weiss’s shoulder, “Weiss, _please_.” she says, her voice desperate now, “We _have_ to go.”

            Weiss looks to her and hesitates for only a moment and that is all Adam needs. He closes the distance between them in an instant, his body twisting in some unnatural way before sending Weiss flying back. Yang feels her own chest cave in at the sight, “ _Weiss_ —“

            Adam twists and Yang barely dodges his blade. He laughs and the voice that comes out is no longer his, “ _Weiss!_ ” He mocks and swings his blade in an arc toward her again. She stumbles back and under, falls into the dirt and rolls away just in time to dodge another blow, “ _Weiss!_ ” He mocks again.

            Yang plants her elbows into the ground in an attempt to get up and discovers the same black tendrils snaking and winding around Adam tying her to the ground. He stumbles over to her, laughing and bleeding like a maniac. His sword drags along the ground and the earth bleeds black in its wake.

            Yang struggles against the veins holding her down desperately. They only wrap tighter, pinning her arms to the ground and twisting around her legs and throat. Adam sways closer and Yang chokes on the fear in her chest.

            Adam stops in front of her, teeth and mask and hair dripping red, hands and nose and sword dripping black, “Did you really think you stood a chance?”

            He raises his blade over her, “Against me?” He sneers. Yang shakes her head against her restraints, opens her mouth to respond until she feels the black veins making their way up and she slams her mouth shut. Adam laughs once and then shakes his head, “You disappoint me.”

            Yang screams against the webs of black now covering her mouth as he readies his blade again and swings down—

            —and directly into Weiss’s stomach.

            The black leaves her mouth, but she doesn’t make a sound. Weiss stumbles back from the blade and Yang feels like her world is turning to ash.

            She falls. Yang can’t move.

            And then Adam laughs, slow, satisfied, and absolutely terrifying, “Are you ever going to be able to protect your friends?” He cackles and slinks over to Weiss.

            She moves then, slow and trembling, reaching for Weiss’s hand. Adam kicks it away.

            Weiss’s breath is shallow and stuttered, her blood is pooling with the black on her back and on Yang’s—on Adam’s hands. His sword swings and stops inches from Weiss’ head. Weiss lets out a shallow breath, but the look in her eyes is fearless. Adam crouches before her and chuckles. His oily hands reach forward and snag white hair, staining it black and red. Yang feels something feral burst to life in her chest, “Let go of her!”

            The black has left her mouth, but it’s grip remains strong around her calves and she falls to the ground again. She growls, digs her fingers desperately into the ground and pulls, “Get away!”

            Adam ignores her. He sneers down at Weiss, the blood from his mask dripping down and falling against her cheek.

            “What was that about me not being the first to promise to kill you?”

            Weiss uses the last bit of strength she has to gather blood in her mouth and spit. Adam reels back only momentarily. The grip in Weiss’s hair tightens, his other hand reaches up and traces her scar, starting from just below her eyebrow and drifting to just above her lips. Yang lets out a dangerous growl.

            Adam looks at her then, “Shut up.”

            He stands and points his blade first at the scar on Weiss’s side and then at the still bleeding wound at it’s opposite. He lets Wilt travel lightly over the bloody planes of her stomach, over her chest and throat, and finally settles again over the scar on Weiss’s eye. “You Schnees preach of your own perfection, but look at you. Look at this uneven mess of blood and bone.” Wilt travels over her nose and presses into the skin just below her right eyebrow. “Let’s even you out.”

            Weiss doesn’t have the strength or breath to scream as he draws a matching line down the right side of her face, so Yang does for her.

            “Stop it! _Stop it_! Let her go!”

            Adam grins up at her, “Fine.”

            He grips Weiss’s limp arm and drags her over, stopping just feet in front of Yang. “Take her.” He says, and then Weiss is thrown into the black dirt in front of her.

            Yang reaches out and tugs her in, curls over her protectively. Adam watches them, black drips from his nose, “Well? I gave her to you. Say something.” He tilts his head, pointed teeth dripping, “Or are you just going to let her die?”

            She tenses and then looks down at Weiss. Her hair is bloody and matted and black, her face much the same. Yet still, when she looks at her, Weiss’s eyes show no fear.

            She brings her trembling hand up to cup Weiss’s cheek, ignores the way the blood feels, “I’m so sorry,” She sobs. “I-I’m so-I’m _so_ sorry.”

            “I should have been there—I should have—I _could_ have done something. I could have done anything and I still—you still—“

            Weiss’s weak, shaking hand finds her cheek softly. Her thumb runs back and forth there, and though she says nothing, Yang understands. It just makes her sob harder, hold on tighter, “Why you?” She asks. “It’s always you. It’s always been you.”

            Blood is seeping between Yang’s fingers now, and Weiss’s breath has become shorter. She runs her fingers through Weiss’s hair, “Please don’t,” She whispers, “Please don’t leave me.”

            Weiss’s hand falls from her cheek and Yang’s world freezes.

            Adam laughs from behind her, “That’s the game!” He yells, “You lose! Try again next time!”

            “...Weiss?”

            A new voice, one that shakes the foundations of what little is left of Yang. Her head swivels, grip not once loosening on Weiss, and looks at her sister. “Ruby!” She screams, “Get out of here! Get out of here right now!”

            Adam hums, “The silver-eyed girl.”

            Ruby takes a shaky step forward, “Yang? What’s wrong with Weiss?”

            Yang grits her teeth to keep from sobbing. Ruby’s voice rises, “Yang. What’s wrong with my partner?”

            Adam steps forward, blocks Yang’s view of her. “She’s dead.” He says, and whatever hides behind that mask gleams, “Died how every Schnee deserves to.”

            Yang doesn’t see it, but she can hear Ruby unleashing Crescent Rose, “You take that back,” She screams, “You’re lying!”

            Adam swings his blade in an arc, like he’s putting on a show. “That Schnee didn’t think I was telling the truth either, earlier. Now look at her.” He laughs, and points Wilt at Ruby. His smile bleeds like his blade, “Your turn.”

            Ruby screams then. Adam lurches forward in slow motion. Yang’s world explodes in bursts of silver, black, and red.

            And then she wakes up.

            She bolts upright in bed, balances her elbow on her knees and tangles her fingers in her hair. Her breath comes in fast and choked, heavy and shallow all at once. Her father’s voice rings in her head. In for four, out for eight.

            Her breathing doesn’t slow, not even for a second. What she saw—what she felt—it’s like someone has her in a stranglehold. Blake leaving. Ruby, always in danger, always being hunted. Weiss dying. All of it real.

            Then an arm wraps around her shoulders and squeezes, another hand coming to rest on her bicep, “Yang?”

            Weiss is there, Weiss is _there_ , and Yang almost gets swept away in the relief that washes over her. She lets herself fall into her, head coming to rest on her collar. Weiss’s fingers find their way gently into her hair.

            Yang has never felt so safe in her life, “He was there—Adam. He—He kept—he looked like a monster. He killed you. He killed everybody.”

            Weiss just holds her, brushes her fingers through her hair and traces circles onto her back, whispering, “Everything’s alright” into her hair.

            Weiss promised to be there, and here she is.

            Weiss pulls back only a little, the hand on Yang’s back coming up to cup her cheek and thumbs away her tears. Yang leans into the cooler touch. Weiss’s cold hands, those same blue, fearless eyes—she thinks that maybe magic takes the form of more than just relics and maidens. She thinks maybe she’s found that magic here, in Weiss’s arms.

            Weiss brushes tangles of sweat-soaked hair from Yang’s cheeks, “That wasn’t real, Yang. This is real. Me, with you.”

            Yang looks at her, sees flashes of that bloodied (bloodied—but not broken) girl in her dream and then lets her head fall to rest against her collar again. “Even that feels like I’m dreaming, sometimes.” she breathes. She can’t deny it. Weiss is so incredibly precious to her.

            Weiss’s fingers still in her hair for moment. Then she pushes Yang back to grip both of her shoulders. It may just be a trick of the sliver of moonlight that has seeped into their room, but Yang thinks she spots a blush on Weiss’s cheeks.

            Weiss pats her cheek twice, “Come on,” she says, “lay back down.”

            Yang does as she’s told, staying as close to Weiss as possible through the process. Weiss doesn’t think twice about winding her arms around her. Yang’s arm finds itself draped across Weiss’s waist, tugging her somehow closer. For a moment, all they can do is stare at each other.

            Yang’s eyes dance over Weiss’s features. She travels down the length of her scar, the slightly upturned corners of her lips, the blue of her eyes. She watches Weiss’s eyes do the same. She can feel the air between them thickening, her stomach tied in knots.

            And then Weiss’s gaze falls for only a second to her shoulder, and her expression falters. She reaches up a hand to Yang’s shoulder, trails it down her arm. Yang shivers. Weiss runs a thumb over the scar tissue on her right arm and whispers, “I’m sorry.”

            Yang trembles and lets her hands travel up and wrap around the one on her shoulder. She looks back to Weiss, and she remembers her, bloody and dying in her arms, remembers that crippling guilt. “You didn’t do this.” She whispers.

            Weiss scoots closer. She takes the hand holding her own and guides it to her stomach, right over where her scar from Cinder’s javelin is. “And you didn’t do this.”

            Yang feels heat smear itself across her cheeks and prays that for once the light hides it. Weiss keeps her hand there, grip tight, her eyes locked on Yang’s own. They’re so close Yang can feel Weiss’s shallow breaths against her, can feel how Weiss’s ribs quiver a bit under her touch.

            Yang almost gets lost in her. Her beauty is that hypnotizing.

            Instead—maybe to break her from her trance or maybe just to feel Weiss again—she lifts her hand. She trails her thumb down the length of Weiss’s scar, the slope of her cheek, the downturned corner of her lip. As she cups a hand beneath Weiss’s chin, Yang feels her twitch—softly, though it’s almost hard to tell in such low light, Weiss is smiling.

            Yang wants to tell her she’s beautiful. She probably wouldn’t think much of it—she’s been called that her whole life. But when they’re like this...

            Instead, she whispers, “You know, I always thought this one made you look pretty badass.”

            Weiss’s answering smile is laced in sadness. “That one hurt.”

            Yang brushes her thumb softly against it one last time and then, before she has time to think, she leans forward and kisses Weiss’s scar.

            She expects Weiss to freeze up. Move away from her. Maybe go back to her own bed and turn her back because Yang just got it so, so wrong.

            But Weiss sits up a little, bracing her arms on the mattress at Yang’s sides so she’s leaning over her. For a foolish, surprisingly hopeful second, Yang thinks Weiss is going to lean down and kiss her for real.

            Instead, she lifts her incomplete arm, ghosting her hand down her shoulder and over her tricep to grip the port for her Atlas arm, and gently leaves a kiss atop the scars.

            Yang’s heart races through all of it, pounding like it’s trying to convince her that this is real. Weiss isn’t a dream.

            She leans back and smiles down at her, sleepy and soft. Yang wants to kiss her. More than anything in this moment, she wants to kiss her.

            Instead, she takes her hand and holds it close.

            She toys with Weiss’s fingers, runs her thumb across them, pulls and twists them in playful, alternating patterns. Weiss hums and allows it, and Yang has to stop looking at her because if she keeps looking at that too-soft expression on her face she won’t be able to stop herself from leaning over and kissing her. So she focuses on her hands.

            They’re soft, softer than she’d imagined they’d be. Weiss has spent her entire life training, years of relentless and overbearing instruction to get to where she is. She thought her hands would be more calloused, rougher. She’s been fighting her entire life, and while Yang wishes it hadn’t been that way for her, it would make sense then for her hands to reflect those hardships. But they’re soft, and gentle, and Yang thinks that’s the true reflection of who Weiss is.

            Through all these things that should’ve made her cold and hard and heartless, she is one of the most caring and selfless people Yang knows.

            And then Yang notices the tiny, jagged things running in lines over Weiss’s knuckles and fingers.

            She tilts her head, “I never noticed these. What are they from?”

            Weiss’s face closes up for only a second, and then she’s the one playing with Yang’s fingers, “I was thirteen. Punched a mirror.” she squeezes Yang’s hand in both of her own, “I guess I learned my lesson. I had to pick up the pieces bare-handed afterwards.”

            Yang frowns, “Still don’t want to take me up on the offer to punch Jackass Schnee?”

            “Yang.”

            “I was only half joking.”

            To her surprise, Weiss giggles. Her heart lurches at the sound.

            She follows the pull and leans down, brings Weiss’s hands up, and lays a kiss on her knuckles, and then down the side of her palm, the barely there scar on the inside of her wrist. She follows the trail of scars back up, makes sure she doesn’t miss a single one.

            Weiss desperately tries to fight her blush down.

            Yang places one last kiss on her knuckles. “If it helps, I really do think they make you look badass.”

            Weiss, still blushing, doesn’t trust herself not to botch her words, so instead she hums. Yang looks at her, so she looks anywhere else, and her eyes land on a barely noticeable scar on Yang’s collar.

            She lifts one of her hands from Yang’s grip and lays her palm across it, thumb running idly back and forth. Yang’s breath hiccups.

            Weiss whispers, “And you? What’s this one from? If we’re exchanging stories.”

            It feels more like they’re mapping each other out, but Yang swallows past the trepidation balling itself in her throat and answers, “Zwei.”

            “...Zwei?”

            “He used to nip.”

            Weiss laughs again, hand still pressed against Yang’s collarbone and holding her hand with the other.

            Yang watches her, eyes closed and laughing blissfully, and thinks maybe she could get used to this. Settling down had never been in her plans, but Yang hears adventure in Weiss’s laugh. Sees the ocean, or maybe the sky—something vast and beautiful and wild, something she's been looking for her whole life—in the blue of her eyes, and thinks maybe being with Weiss wouldn’t feel like settling at all.

            Weiss’s laugh turns into giggles and then trails off further when she shifts to place a kiss against the scar. Yang feels all the knots in her stomach expand and explode like fireworks.

            Weiss leans back, but not by much, “Well, it’s not the most badass story in the world, but _if it helps_ ,” she grins, “it does _look_ kind of cool.”

            “Yeah, well,” Yang whispers shakily, clears her throat softly. Weiss is so close. It’s stifling in the best of ways. “If anyone asks, I got in a fight with seven Ursai—no, Nevermores—and won.” She flicks Weiss’s shoulder, “I’m putting my reputation on the line by telling you that. Our little secret.”

            Weiss, with her hand already on Yang’s collarbone, draws an ‘x’ into the skin there, “Cross my heart.”

            Yang feels that pull in her heart again, “Technically, that’s _my_ heart you’re swearing on.”

            Weiss scoots up on the pillow so that she and Yang are only inches apart. Yang fights desperately against that pull to bridge the space, to see if their lips fit together as well as their bodies do. Weiss smiles, “Guess you better stick around and make sure I keep my promise, then.”

            Yang feels Weiss’s breath pass over her lips and sees that soft thing in her eyes again and this time her soul joins in with her heart, tugging and pulling her desperately in Weiss’s direction. Instead, she squeezes the hand still in her grip lightly, “Guess so.”

            Weiss yawns. “We...really should try and get some sleep.”

            Yang, heart racing and soul trembling, nods, “Yeah. Good plan.”

            Weiss curls into Yang this time, and Yang doesn’t hesitate to wrap her arm around her and pull her in close. It’s the most she can do to sate the pull.

            Weiss grins sleepily, eyes closed, “Goodnight, Yang.”

            Yang snuggles in closer and buries her cheek in white hair, “Goodnight, Weiss.”

+

            Weiss processes that it’s early before she processes that she’s awake the next morning. The house is silent, no sleepy footsteps against the hardwood outside, no Nora loudly demanding pancakes, no early morning birdsong. Just her and the quiet and Yang.

            She’s tucked under Yang’s chin, her not-so-soft snores only slightly muffled in Weiss’s hair. At some point Yang must have turned, because now their legs and hair and arms are hopelessly tangled together. Weiss finds she doesn’t mind too much.

            Well, the combined bedhead she might mind, but the rest is fine.

            Weiss listens, and when still not a sound is heard she decides there is nothing more important to her right then than staying right there, and keeping Yang with her. She allows herself to snuggle closer, the arm thrown around Yang’s waist tightening. Yang shifts closer, nose pressing into the crown of her head, breath fanning out over her scar.

            For a second, everything about Weiss softens. She smiles and then shifts slowly to press another kiss to the scar on Yang’s collar, and then lets her lips travel back over to the scar tissue on Yang’s shoulder and presses a kiss there, too.

            She stays like that for awhile longer, until scattered yawns quietly echo outside their door, until the sleepy shuffling of feet in the hall turns into the sound of preparing breakfast.

            Only when the others decide they no longer wanted to try and stay quiet does she think to get up.

            Bare feet slap against hardwood and then skid to a halt directly outside of their door, and the a knock sounds, “Yang! Weiss! Breakfast is almost ready! Time to get your sleepy butts up!” Ruby sounds.

            Yang groans softly, and Weiss sighs, “Fine. We’ll be out in a minute.”

            She tilts her head up, neither relinquishing their hold on the other quite yet, “Guess there’s no putting it off any longer.”

            Yang doesn’t open her eyes, but her face scrunches up like a child denied a toy. She grunts and then shifts down, burying herself in Weiss’s collar this time to block out the light, “Five more minutes…”

            Weiss, blushing, untangles her legs from Yang’s and pats her side, “Come on, sleepy head. Before Nora eats all the pancakes.”

            Yang tries to re-tangle their legs together in a last ditch effort to keep her there, but Weiss swings over the edge of the bed and stands before she has the chance. She reaches for her blearily, only one eye opening to find her.

            Weiss giggles and dances out of Yang’s sleepy, grabby reach. Yang lets her arm fall, defeated, “Nooo...”

            She lets out mostly fake whimpers and then finally swings her legs over the side of the bed, shoulders slouched and eye stills stubbornly closed.

            Weiss rolls her eyes at the display, a smile playing at her lips. She walks over to the night stand and grabs Yang’s prosthetic. She holds it gently and walks back to Yang, bringing up her other hand to stifle a yawn. She sits beside Yang and rests her head on her shoulder. Yang relaxes into her soundlessly.

            With a click Weiss pops Yang’s prosthetic in place. Yang tenses, surprised. .

            Weiss takes a second, pressing into her more, and then gasps. She shoots back, her arm still holding Yang’s bicep. She finally cracks an eye open to look at her.

            “I-I’m sorry—I should’ve asked—“ Weiss starts. Yang shakes her head, smiling.

            “Well, at least let me help you out too, princess.”    

            Yang yawns and Weiss takes the few seconds she has of her eyes being closed again to fight down the blush on her cheeks. She clears her throat, “Help me with what?”

            Yang hums, rolls the question around, gives Weiss a quick once over. She spots the piece of fabric Weiss wraps around her waist draped neatly over the headboard of their bed behind her. She leans over to grab it, and Weiss desperately tries to ignore how close she is.

            She stretches the fabric in her hands taut in front of her, “Need any help with this?

            Weiss rolls her eyes, “Not really. But if you insist.”

            Yang grins. Weiss stands from beside her and Yang takes her hand, guiding her to stand between her knees. Weiss tries to make sure her own knees stay locked, tries to hide the fact that they feel like they’ll give out any second now, this close to her.

            Yang leans in, grabs the wrap from the opposite side and pulls it taut. It forces Weiss in a step. She tries to ignore their proximity, the tension thick enough to cut, but then her eyes fall on the scar peeking out of the twin holes in Weiss’s dress.

            She stops, cloth still tight on either side of Weiss, trapping her. Weiss brings a hand down to rest on one of hers, “You okay?”

            Yang nods, eyes still fixated on the mark.

            “...Are you sure?”

            Yang uses the fabric to pull Weiss in further, wrapping her arms around Weiss’s waist and burying her nose in Weiss’s stomach. Weiss goes tense, but her hand immediately falls to Yang’s shoulder and the other settles in her hair. “Yang?” She asks, blushing and heart pounding.

            Yang hums, nose pressing just above the scar, “I’m just...really glad that you exist.”

            Weiss’s fingers bury deeper in Yang’s hair as she noses softly at her scar. Weiss lets the hand on Yang’s shoulder fall to play and run over where skin meets metal, “I’m glad that you exist, too.”

            Yang presses her forehead to the scar briefly, and then leans back. She smiles up at her and then finishes tying up the fabric.

            “Okey Dokey! All done!”

            Weiss slowly steps away from her, already finding that she misses the intimacy, “Now we just have to handle our bed head.”

            Yang laughs, “Easier said than done, you move a lot in your sleep.”

            Weiss glowers at her, “And you snore.”

            “Snoring doesn’t mat up your hair now, does it?”

            Weiss huffs, “If it was my fault maybe I should fix it, then?”

            They both freeze, Weiss more than Yang. She rocks back on her heels, fingers tapping across her forearm. A nervous tick she’s had since their Beacon days.

            “I mean—that was—I was mostly joking—I know how sensitive you are about your hair, so—“

            Yang crosses her legs, “Do you want to?”

            Weiss hesitates. This isn’t established territory. Hand-holding, sharing a bed, even scar kisses now, apparently, was all established territory. That was safe. _This_ is new. This is dangerous. She needs to stop falling for this burning sun of a girl as fast as possible—she needs to stop hoarding all of Yang’s light.

            But then Yang tilts her head like an overly curious puppy and Weiss is done for. “Yes. I want to.”

            Yang sends her that beautiful, lop-sided grin that she’s seen fell entire gangs. She wonders if she too is just trapped under that spell.

            Yang hands her a brush. Weiss takes hold, but stays standing, “…Really?”

            “I trust you, Weiss.”

            Weiss sits then, more because her knees finally gave out then anything. Yang turns away from her. She reaches up.

             She threads her fingers through Yang's hair gently, careful not to tug a single strand. She ignores the way her chest tightens when Yang closes her eyes and leans her head back into Weiss’s stomach, further ignores the impulse to lean down and plant a kiss on her forehead.

            She brushes through her hair softly and then tugs it all up into a high ponytail behind her head.

            “Done.”

            Yang sighs softly and then slowly, hesitantly leans away from her. Yang grins, “not bad!”

            She turns, too fast for Weiss to react, and abruptly tugs Weiss's hair free. She smiles, “My turn!”

            She gathers Weiss's hair in her hands gently, pulls it up. She leaves most of it free, cascading down her shoulders like freshly fallen snow. She brushes through the majority she left flowing down her shoulders and spreading onto their bed.

            “You know,” She starts once she’s finished, reaching up to brush a few flyaway strands of hair from Weiss's cheeks, “I always thought you would look pretty with your hair down.”

            Weiss smiles and only once she feels the shift on the palm of her hand does she realize she is still very much cupping Weiss’s cheek. She starts, moves to withdraw, to apologize. But then Weiss’s hand is over her own, holding her there. She leans into Yang’s touch.

            “Thank you, Yang.”   

            Yang feels that pull again, and this time—with Weiss already so close, and inching closer; with those endlessly blue eyes _right there_ , and promising her forever—it’s too much to ignore.

            Weiss grins at her, still a little sleepy, but relaxed.

            Whatever protest Yang had, whatever little she had left in her to try and fight this development, withers away.

            “You look beautiful.” She whispers.

            They’re so close now. Weiss can feel Yang exhale across her lips. Their eyes never leave each other’s.

            They’re too preoccupied, too absorbed in that moment and it’s enormity, too absorbed in each other, to hear the sound of impending chaos.

            Ruby throws open their door with no warning, “Guys! C’mon you’re gonna miss all of the pancakes!”

            Weiss and Yang shoot away from each other, only just aware how close they were. Yang feels heat bubble up her neck and spread across her face, “Oh, uh, yeah, Ruby. Sorry, we were just getting ready.”

            Ruby huffs, displeased. Yang turns to Weiss apologetically. She chuckles, rolls her eyes, and then smiles at her, “I’ll head back down with you, Ruby. And Yang, I’ll save you some pancakes while you finish getting ready.”

            Yang nods slowly, focuses on slowing her heartbeat, on ignoring that insistent pull. She takes a deep breath. Would the “in for four, out for eight” trick work for this kind of situation?

            Weiss joins Ruby at the doorway. Ruby beams, “Oh! Weiss! Your hair is so pretty like that!”

            “Thank you,” She says, “You actually _can_ thank your sister for that.”

           

+

 

            Yang cracks her knuckles, then her neck. Qrow waits for her across the training mat, his hands tucked patiently behind his back. Afternoon sunlight suffuses through the windows over his shoulders, making him into a silhouette—but a very visible target. He brings one hand out to his side, three fingers up. Two. One. When his hand makes a perfect fist, Yang tilts forward on her toes and rockets to his end of the mat, Atlas fist-first.

            Qrow dodges, smoothly. Yang blows a frustrated huff and punches again. Misses. He goes on the attack, aiming for her ribcage. She evades it, skids to the edge of the mat. Smirking, he waits for her to move again. His patience drives up her temper. She uses it as fuel to throw herself towards him, releasing the cry that’s been building behind her teeth.

            Punch, miss, turn. Punch, miss, turn. Yang’s frustration becomes kinetic, burning up the column of her neck, into her cheeks. Punch, block. Qrow’s bent arm collides with her fist.

            “The General’s arm’s got nothing on my seasoned reflexes, huh?” he teases.

            She loops his arm under his, then breaks away his grip. Punches again. Her hit lands, but only grazes his shoulder.

            “You’re worse than my dad,” she says, gritting her teeth.

            Qrow just laughs. She pulls her arm back to try another hit, but her uncle grabs her wrist, her shoulder, and flips her onto her back. If not for the mat to cushion her fall, the move would’ve knocked the wind right out of her lungs.

            “That was cold,” says Qrow. He looms over her, still smirking, but there’s nothing malicious in it. “Even for you, firecracker.”

            Yang brings her knees in and takes a deep breath. Braces her hands on her hips. “Want to go another round?”

            “It’s nice to see the enthusiasm, but I think you ought to take a breather.”

            Slowly, Yang rolls into a sitting position, draping her aching arms over the ridges of her knees. Qrow sits down beside her in a near matching pose. He takes out his flask, which causes Yang’s eyes to thin (she really wishes he wouldn’t drink so much, though she knows he can’t help it), but he’s only brought it out to fiddle with it; he’s worked himself up to keep fighting, and that energy has to go somewhere. That much is a feeling she can understand.

            “How are things with your teammates?” he prods.

            If Yang has any strength left after sparring, she exhales it. “They’re going.”

            “Descriptive answer.”

            She closes her eyes, sees them all together at the market the other day. It wasn’t long enough. After breakfast, Ruby took off to train with Oscar and Jaune, and Blake with Sun and Ilia. Between her and Weiss and this strange thing blooming between them, this silent understanding wrapped in nights in a shared bed and gentle, fiery kisses to each other’s scars, it feels her team of four is down to two.

            It’s all too much to wrangle with, she decides—especially after losing a spar with her _Uncle._  

            “Come on,” Yang says, giving a shake of her head. “You can tell when I don’t want to talk.”

            Qrow keeps pushing. “You’re right,” he concedes, only to follow with, “But I think you do want to talk.”

            Yang’s jaw feathers. “We’re adjusting, okay?” she says, and laments the way she can’t control the way her voice rises, the way anger pours into her before she can dam it. “Blake is back, and says she’s not going anywhere, so we just have to get back to being a team. Ruby isn’t having any problems with it.”

            “Have you and Blake talked? One on one?”

            “We will,” Yang says, and her shoulders dip closer to her knees. “Eventually. I figure I’ll corner her on the boat; it’s not like she can run away, there.”

            “You know, communication is important. Knowing what everybody needs, how they like to be talked to—that keeps a team together.”

            _I’m trying. I’ve always been trying, and I’ve only gotten through to one. And it’s giving me feelings I don’t understand. Ones I’d be afraid of, if not for the fact I know this girl is the best thing I’ve ever had. Maybe it’s just that I’m afraid to lose her, after everything..._

            She doesn’t want her Uncle to know this, though. Yang can’t imagine him understanding.

            So her words come out bitter. “What do you know about that?” she asks him. “Your team fell apart.”

            This seems to stun him. He blinks a few times, eyes trained on the far wall. She contemplates leaving, cutting his time to gather his words.

            But then he turns to her, something sad in his eyes, and she chooses to listen.

            “Look. Team STRQ broke off for...a lot of reasons. Complicated ones, ones I’m not sure you’re ready to understand,” he says. “But you can look at our failure as a cautionary tale. You want to keep your team together? Then attack the problems at the root, instead of letting them grow out of control.”

            “Is that what you did?”

            Qrow shakes the flask in his hand. It sounds nearly empty. “You know your Uncle, kid. He means well, but he makes a lot of mistakes.”

            “What kind of mistakes?”

            “I told you I’d tell you all of Team STRQ’s inappropriate stories when you were older, right?”

            Yang nods. “Yeah, and I’m eighteen now.”

            “Well, a lot of them just hurt,” he says. He stares into the flask’s silver cap like he’ll find something there. “Hurt to hear, and hurt to tell.”

            He untwists the cap. Lifts the flask. Drinks.

            “Did you leave them too?” Yang asks. “Like my mom did?”

            Qrow looks back to her—this cuts him. She can tell by the way his whole face seems to droop, the shadows beneath his eyes seeming darker.

            “Your mom didn’t leave the team, Yang. We’d broken up by then,” he says. “Your mom just left your dad.”

            “And me,” Yang blurts. A dull ache spreads the length of her jaw, and she swallows against it.

            “Never said I liked my sister, did I?”

            “No. She’s...hard to like.”

            “She was family, though,” he says as he screws the cap back on his flask. “That whole team was my family. But, we all have our own reasons for doing the things we did. Your dad—he got lucky. Summer was the best person who could’ve stepped in to take care of you.” He glances down, now, the memories pressing on his shoulders. “And...she was good for your dad. Summer, she’d had people leave her behind, too. They knew how to mend each other.”

            “She didn’t have to leave us, though. She didn’t have to go on that mission. Just like Blake didn’t have to run, but she did.”

            “And you should be thankful she came back.”

            Tension coils the air. Qrow is almost glaring at her, his red eyes the coldest they’ve ever been, but it does nothing to freeze the heaving in her shoulders, the anger swelling up her throat.

            “You don’t understand,” she grinds out.

            To her surprise, he softens. “I thought you might say that.”

            He rests a hand on her shoulder. “Listen. Summer was my partner,” he says. “When she died, it was like losing half of myself. I saw shadows of that same pain in you after Blake left. But now she’s back, and you have a chance to reconcile. You’ve just got to understand she might not be able to fill all the gaps she left.”

            Yang nods along, digesting his words the best she can. Strangely, it cools her down. She didn’t know Summer was his partner—she didn’t really know _anything_ about her parents’ team, other than that they were, and then they weren’t. Her father still wears the scars of their past; that’s why it took him so long to tell her about Raven. But Qrow isn’t Raven. Neither is her father, or Summer. And neither is Blake.

            “I...I think I get that,” Yang says.

            Qrow offers his other hand to help her to her feet. “You just got your spark back, kiddo,” he says, patting her once on the shoulder. “Let’s keep it burning.”

            “You’ll be down for a rematch tomorrow?”

            “I’m counting on it.”

            He gives her a high-five, then Yang leaves him in the training room. As she’s walking out, she feels the beginning of a smile shake at the corner of her lip.

            Blake, Ruby, Weiss, even Yang herself—they’re all _good_ people. And between the four of them, there might be just enough kindness, just enough love, to sew their team back together.

 

+

 

            Weiss centers herself on the training room floor, two fingers poised to drag up the length of Myrtenaster’s blade. At the far end of the floor, Professor Ozpin watches behind eyes that aren’t his, his magic cane braced against his chest. Coils of green light crawl slowly to the top, as if it’s charging.

            While half of them are off sparring with Qrow today, the rest of them are doing solo drills with Oz. “In case of separation,” he insisted, doing his best to make a child’s voice into one of authority. Weiss doesn’t understand it—there are nine of them, now, ten if you count Oscar when Oz is in the clouds. The chances of total separation are slim.

            But here she is, alone on the training room floor, moments from facing a barrage of dust and phantom Grimm. She imagines it won’t be too different from her summoning sessions with Winter, where her sister would unleash on her some of the most fearsome Grimm she’d ever conquered. If she could handle that, then this drill should be easy.

            The only difference is Oz is far more powerful than Winter, and Weiss isn’t exactly in her best fighting shape.

            “Are you ready, Miss Schnee?”

            “Ready,” she calls. She forces confidence, but the break in her voice comes loud on the echo.

            Oz’s cane flashes starry white as he casts it forward, filling the training room with swirls of luminous green. They float around the edges like a putrid fog before ribboning into the finite shapes of Grimm, all snarling and ready to pounce.

            Weiss starts the dance with her glyphs. The phantom Grimm charge for her, and she hits them with fire, then ice. They come at her from all sides. She jumps from one glyph to another, trying earnestly to evade them, or at least get to higher ground so she can fire above, but there’s an instinct she can’t shake that’s throwing her focus—she looks between the Grimm, for bodies, for allies. She doesn’t get why she’s doing this. Weiss has faced far more daunting enemies than a few simulated Grimm; she knows what she’s doing. Always, she has trained alone.

            So why does she keep looking for her teammates? For Yang?

            “This is a simulation, Miss Schnee,” Oz cries across the room. “Your teammates are down. You are not going to find them.”

            More light spills from the cane, taking the shape of ghostly flames. Weiss swears she can feel the heat pouring off of them—it’s not a good kind.

            _You’re surrounded._

Grimm come at her, armor blazing. She counters with ice.

            _They aren’t going to rescue you._

She aims her weapon in a fury, carelessly. She would never want to hurt Oscar—he’s just a kid—but gods, if she could just freeze that _voice._

            _You’re all alone._

The green light makes prisms of her ice, turning the floor to a kaleidoscope of ocean fractals. She tries fire again, and she makes a mess. Like always.

            But Weiss doesn’t want to fight like this. Weiss needs her team. She needs rhythms to play off of, melodies to harmonize with. There’s a target on her back and she needs somebody to watch it.

            _Your teammates aren’t here for you, Weiss. Yang won’t come to save you if you fail._

            Ozpin’s voice stitches into her father’s. He shouldn’t be allowed to say her name. He would only try to take Yang away from her. He would hate the kindness she gives her, the love she makes her feel.

            She can’t lose Yang. Yang, who steadies her. Yang, who would find her in this sea of fragmented light and anchor her to shore.

            _This is your fight, and yours alone._

“No!” she cries, throwing herself into a phantom Ursa, spraying fire at its head.

            The hit does little to phase the Grimm. She rolls across the training room floor, and it isn’t until she stands again that she realizes she’s crying. The Ursa looms, and Weiss does her best to load more dust, but her shaky, scarred (gods, there are so many _scars_ ) fingers can only dial another capsule so quickly.

            _You’re going too slow,_ Oz says. _You’ll never be good enough,_ her father adds.  She jumps back from the Ursa, and it claws at her, threatening to rip her apart.

            Doesn’t it know she’s already shattered?

            Swing, roll, jump. _No one else can pick up your pieces._

No. They can’t. But Yang has tried. Yang is the only one who’s ever tried. To put her back together, and to help her stay that way.

            She won’t fight without her. She doesn’t _have to._

            Weiss barely hears herself scream her surrender. She throws Myrtenaster to the floor, letting it shake and clatter as it rolls out of reach. The phantoms barely part before she runs out of the training room, tears streaming over her cheeks.

            The halls pass in a blur of reds and greens, a few tiny smudges of light. To Weiss, they feel like a vortex, cold gray fuzzing at the edges. She can focus only on the destination, the one place here she knows is safe. Yang won’t be in their room; she was in Qrow’s group, with Blake and her Faunus friends. But Weiss can pretend she’s there, lay down in their now-shared bed and pretend that her weight is on the other side of her, that the afternoon sun on her back is Yang’s unwavering warmth, like she’s sharing her aura, healing her…

            “Weiss, wait up!”

            The voice behind her is Ruby. Her teammate. Her partner. Weiss should welcome her, let her be the one to clean up the mess, for once.

            Instead, she just keeps running.

            When she reaches the door to her room, she throws a sweaty hand onto the handle and bolts inside. She can hear Ruby’s footsteps crescendo down the hall, but she slams the door on them. Locks it. She splays her hands across the wood, hoping to balance herself, but her breaths only come faster, panic rising like a cold flood in her chest.

            Someone pounds on the door, jarring her focus. This time, it’s Jaune’s voice that sounds on the other side. “Please, Weiss. We just want to help you.”

            Her jaw tightens. “Not. You.”

            Caging a sob with the press of her hand, she stalks towards the bathroom to wash her face, cool her cheeks. Later on, she might regret being so cruel to the boy who saved her life, but not now.

            It’s not that she wants to be alone—she just wants someone who understands her kind of loneliness.

            Weiss doesn’t turn on the bathroom light. The afternoon sun barely reaches, painting half her face in ghoulish shadows. She doesn’t look like herself, and maybe it’s better that way.

            She runs the water and douses her face. Scrubs, hard enough to raise a blush. It’s an ugly one, she decides, making her scar seem redder, almost purple like a bruise. She doesn’t want to look at it anymore.

            Shaking the droplets from her hands, she heads for the bed, closes her eyes, and pretends Yang will be there to meet her.

 

+

            When Yang walks into the kitchen, she’s surprised to find Ruby and Jaune there as well.

            She blinks, leans against the fridge, “What are you two doing here? I thought you were with Oscar and Weiss out training right now?”

            Ruby slumps onto the counter. Jaune sighs and pats her back. He’s good at acting like a pillar for someone so hurt. Yang supposes they’re the same in that regard. She tilts her head, “Ruby? Are you okay?”

            Ruby groans against the counter and Jaune winces. “We’re fine,” He says slowly, “Something happened to Weiss.”

            Every one of Yang’s alarm bells go off, “What?” she breathes. She rushes over to the two of them, places her hands on the counter to hold most of her weight there for fear of toppling over, “What happened?”

            Ruby drags her face across the counter to look at her, “I don’t know. Os—Professor Ozpin was instructing her and she just...took off. I went after her. She wouldn’t let me in.” She lets out a hollow, sad laugh, “Some things never change, I guess.”

            Yang wants to counter, because Weiss has changed more than any of them, but her concern is starting to feel like an anchor in her stomach and she’s going to drown with it. “Where’d she go?” She asks, “Do you know?”

            “Your room,” She looks pleadingly up at her sister, “maybe she’ll let you in.”

+

            Weiss staggers over to her and Yang’s bed, breath ragged. _What did I tell you about that, Weiss_ , her father’s voice echoes, _it's unsightly_.

            Weiss sits and tangles her fingers in her hair, trying and failing to measure her breaths.

            She almost died. Cinder almost killed her that night. She remembers how it felt; once the shock had subsided it had been dreadfully cold. Her breath had come in short, desperate gasps. Her blood pooling on the floor, seeping through her fingers, staining her. She remembers being seven and Winter helping her clean a cut from her first training session away, remembers being thirteen and Klein patching up bleeding knuckles from a now shattered mirror, remembers being sixteen and clutching at her bleeding face, and this time alone.

            Her fingers trace down the line of her scar, a physical fracture. Her fingers drift to the one on her stomach, a patch-up job at best of yet another mess she had made. She hears her own voice, younger, knuckles still bleeding, _I don’t want to be alive anymore, Klein_.

            She has lived through so much, too much, and now she is going to be sent right back. No matter how hard she tries, how hard she fights, she fails. She wonders if dying at Cinder’s hand would have been a mercy.

            And then she thinks of Yang, the one person who has ever tried, _really_ tried, to be there for her. She would die before allowing herself to be just another name in that girl’s list of deserters.

She gets it now, Yang’s nightmares about her. Now that she is faced with the very real possibility of losing her she _gets_ it. Losing Yang is the most terrifying thing she’s had to face in months.  
            She pictures her warmth beside her, covering her, guarding her. She wants to hold her, she wants her to _be_ there. She _needs_ her to be here. Her father’s voice laughs at her, _Pathetic_ , he sneers, _Schnees don’t rely on anyone. We are all we have_.

              _I am more than a name_ , rings hollow in her head.

            _No, you’re not_.

            She squeezes her eyes shut, feels herself fracture. She digs the heels of her palms into her eyes. Everything feels like it’s compressing, closing in on her, judging her. She looks up, her eyes meet her reflection. Scathing eyes, her father’s eyes, rake over her, rank her. Her hair is a mess, her scar stands out like a beacon of imperfection. _God, Weiss, you’re a disaster_.

            Her fingers dig into the bedding, chills shoot up her arm.

            And then there’s a sharp, insistent knock at her door. She wipes at her eyes—no tears, yet, that’s one success. “Ruby, I told you. I’m fine—“

            “It’s Yang,” Weiss stills, “Please let me in?”

            Her voice hinges on desperate. Weiss is at the door before she can comprehend that she’s moved. The door opens, and there she is, worry spread like a burn across her features. She steps in, closes the door behind her, and takes one of Weiss’s shaking hands into her own. “Weiss,” her name has so much more purpose in her voice, “Are you okay?”

            _You’re so pathetic_.

            “I’m fine.” She says. The press on her hand tightens. She feels her father’s grip, pulling her everywhere and anywhere and apart, and quickly lets go of Yang’s hand. She shakes her head, “I’m fine.” She says, and drops onto their bed.

            Yang sits beside her, takes her hands in her own again. She shivers at the cool touch from her prosthetic, but it’s comforting, in it’s own way. The arm may be Atlas-made, but it is still entirely Yang.

            She whispers, “Weiss, you can talk to me. You know that.”

            Weiss shakes her head. Yang has enough weight to bear without her adding to it with her own problems. _Good, Weiss_.

            Oddly enough, her father’s praising voice only makes her feel worse. “I’m fine.”

            “Are you sure? Do you need anything?”

            _You_ , she thinks, _only you,_ but her lips are frozen. Yang tries again, “Water? I can run and get a glass.”

             Weiss tries to move, to shake her head, to say no, but nothing works and everything feels like it’s shattering. _Pick up the pieces, Weiss_. _You’re the only one who can._

            Yang let's go of her hand and then stands, “I'm gonna go get that glass of water for you, okay? When I come back we can talk, if you want. If you don't, that's okay too. We can watch a movie. Something relaxing. Just us, okay?”

            Yang makes it halfway across their room before Weiss is behind her again, gripping her hands desperately. Weiss’s eyes seem hollowed out, downcast, but her grip is strong. Yang wastes no time squeezing back, “Weiss?”

            Weiss’s lips open, close, open again. She’s fumbling over her words, tripping over her own flaws. Yang remains, hold on her hand steady. Weiss draws strength from that steadiness, “I—stay. Stay with me. Please?”

            Yang turns without letting go of her hand, reaches forward with metal fingers to brush some of Weiss's hair back and behind her ear, tries and fails to ignore how she finches. She hates that it took her this long to be here for her, hates that it took her so long to see her like this.

 “I'm right here, Weiss.” She lays her grip on her quivering shoulders, hoping to still them. To offer some measure of comfort, however small.

            Weiss trembles, “Don’t leave.”

            Yang takes a step closer. “I won’t.” she promises.

            Something in Weiss, whatever she had been using for all of these years to fortify her walls, finally cracks and gives out. Every piece of her is shattered and broken and ugly, and here is Yang, with fingers too soft and light too bright, trying once again to pick up her pieces. She thinks back to their reunion at Raven’s camp, how her knight had faded when she found herself in Yang’s arms. It makes sense now. She doesn’t have to be strong, to be guarded, around Yang.        

            She’s _allowed_ to be broken.

            So the voice that comes out next, broken and trembling and fragile, is entirely her own. “I hate him.”

             Yang leans her head to the side questioningly, “Who—Ozpin?”

            Weiss just looks up at her, her eyes reflecting eighteen broken years, and Yang knows. Yang’s grip on her shoulders strengthens. “He can’t hurt you, Weiss. Not while I’m here.”

            Weiss breaks, “I...I don’t—“ Trembling hands find purchase and grip tight around Yang’s hands. “I don’t want to be taken again.”

            In an instant, everything about Yang softens. She steps in closer. “You won’t be. I won’t let him get anywhere near you.” she promises.

            Weiss nods slowly, “You’ll stay with me there?”

            Yang runs her thumb across Weiss’s knuckles, “And after, if you want.”

            Weiss gives a shaky nod. That’s all she wants.

            Yang brings her Atlas hand to her neck, reaching her thumb to her cheek. Weiss tenses under her touch.                      

            Yang flinches, “I’m sorry. That’s...too cold.”

            She starts to draw her hand away but Weiss places her own hand over it, keeping it there beneath her jaw. “It’s okay,” she says, “It’s okay when it’s you.” Yang’s touch isn’t cold, or controlling. It feels like Yang is pulling apart the dark and letting light in.

            The air between them (there isn’t much of it, with Yang standing so close) seems to swirl.

            Weiss rests her forehead into Yang’s, and Yang leans into it, cupping her jaw with both hands. She’s so _warm_. She feels like what home is supposed to be. What maybe home can be, now.     

            Yang feels that pull again, insistent. She has no intentions of ignoring it this time, “Are you sure?” she whispers, two questions in one.

            Weiss nods. Their noses bump. Her heart is beating out of control, but her words are firm. “I’m sure.”  

            Yang tilts her head, leaving Weiss no time to second-guess herself before their lips connect. Yang’s lips have been all over her forehead, her cheeks, her scars, but she likes them best here, she thinks. They’re soft, warm. Everything they should be.

            But then she pulls away, startled at herself.

            She feels heat petal across her cheeks as Yang’s eyes open. She stammers, “I—uh, sorry.”

            Yang laughs, bright and loud and beautiful, “You know,” she says, eyes twinkling, “you’re the first person to ever apologize after kissing me.”

            Weiss blushes head to toe, “Sorry.” she says again. Neither have let go of each other yet.

Yang’s thumbs run over her cheeks, eyes filled with something soft that she doesn’t dare name, “Weiss,” She whispers, “I’m with you, okay? I won’t let him touch you.”

            Her fingers on Weiss’s cheeks burn in the best of ways. She grips Yang’s wrist and turns her head to lay a kiss there, “I’m with you, too.” it means _I’m staying_ , it means _you’re stuck with me_ , it means _I love you_.

            Yang smiles, a close-lipped, soft thing that stirs butterflies in Weiss’s stomach and makes her knees tremble. She wraps her arms around Yang’s shoulders to steady herself, digs her fingers into her hair. Yang’s hands drift down, wrap around her waist and press against the small of her back. Weiss bumps her forehead against hers, and for a moment they just breathe each other in. And then Yang bumps their noses together, a question. One of Weiss’s hands find Yang’s jaw, an answer. Yang leans in and for just a moment, Weiss allows herself to be a princess. She waits for magic to find her.

            It does, soft and slow, but sure. Yang sighs into her. they move together like old partners. For a moment she’s never actually imagined before, it’s absolutely perfect.

            They part, but Weiss finds that isn’t nearly enough, so she leans in again, and again, and again. They melt into each other, fit together like puzzle pieces, and Weiss thinks that maybe she found a bit of herself again, here in Yang’s arms.

            “I—“ she starts, but Yang leans in again to silence her. “—Yang—“ again, “— _Yang_.”

            Yang stops, rests their foreheads together again and tries to catch her breath. The rasp in her voice makes Weiss shiver against her, “Yeah, snowflake?”

            Weiss grins, pats her cheek, “Do you think we should go back out there? I’m sure they’re worried.”

            Yang hums, eyes closed, “Probably.” she says, but makes no effort to let go of her. Weiss holds on tighter, “I need to go apologize to your sister and Jaune.”

            Yang nods, “Probably.”

            “…is that going to be your only answer?”

            “Probably.”

            Weiss giggles and Yang melts against her. Her heart jumps and presses against her ribs, trying to reach her, and Yang sees no need in denying herself, so she kisses her again. Weiss hums and then pulls away, “Really, Yang, just for a minute.”

            Yang grunts, “You keep cutting me off,” The rasp in her voice settles and rumbles in her chest, “I haven’t had nearly enough of you.”

            Weiss blushes, and then laughs, “You’re ridiculous,” she giggles. She kisses her just once more and then steps back, pries her way out of Yang’s relentless grip. “Come on, only for a minute.”

            Yang sighs. “Okay,” she says. She takes Weiss’s hand in her own, laces their fingers together. “Let’s get going.”

            Weiss squeezes her hand, “Hey, Yang?”

            She turns to look at her, “Yeah?”

            “Thank you,” she whispers, “for everything.”

            Yang stops and brings her hands up to her lips, “You don’t have to thank me for that. I _want_ to be there for you.”

            Weiss smiles, “I know. Thank you, anyway.”

            Yang leaves a kiss on her knuckles, her scars.  Her father had always insisted she hide them away, that she should be ashamed of them. But with every kiss, Yang has begun to give them new meaning, to give her new meaning. Warmth spreads from the kisses on her knuckles and tingles down her arms, and she clings to it, that warmth.

            Yang’s eyes open, fix on her, and Weiss is briefly thinks of sunsets. Oranges and lilacs mixing and melting together, readying the sky for stars. Weiss spent so much of her life missing things, ignoring sunsets. She swears, to herself, to Yang, to her father, no longer will she ignore that light.

            “You’re not alone, Weiss. As long as I’m around, you have me.”

            Weiss kisses her, basks in the light she’s sworn to follow. Yang hums against her, holding her close. They kiss like they have time, like they’re young and dumb and in love, and not teenagers with the weight of the world falling on their shoulders. Maybe now, maybe together, they could lift that weight.

            Weiss pulls away, face red, “I know.” She says, because she does, because Yang hasn’t let her down once since she’s known her, “You have me, too.”

            Yang feels something like a smile pull at her lips, “I know.”

            For a few more minutes, they stand there, holding each other softly. And then Yang pulls back, rests her forehead against Weiss’s again, “You said you wanted to find my sister?”

            Weiss sighs and then nods, their noses bump, “Yes. We should go.”

            She grabs Yang’s hand, “The sooner we get this over with the sooner we can come right back.”       Weiss almost feels the extra bounce in Yang’s step at the words. “Hell yes.” She almost-whispers. Weiss rolls her eyes.

            Later that night, when they’re settling into each other again, Yang pulls Weiss close, kisses the crown of her head. “Are you okay?”

            Weiss snuggles into the crook of Yang’s neck, leaving another sleepy kiss on her collar, “Why wouldn’t I be?” she almost laughs at the question, “I have you, right?” because she finds she isn’t as scared of Atlas’s cold so long as Yang and her warmth are with her.

            Yang smiles, “Yeah, you do.” she whispers, “You always will.”

            Weiss hums, “You’ve said that, like, four times today.”

            “Yeah, well, stop bringing it up and I won’t have to repeat myself.”

            “I wasn’t saying I didn’t like hearing it.”

             Yang chuckles, leaves a kiss on Weiss’s temple where she can reach, “Goodnight, snowflake.”        Weiss leans up to plant a real kiss, soft and slow and sleepy, on her lips. She settles again, “Goodnight, Yang.”

            That night, neither of them have nightmares.

+

            Weiss wakes to Yang’s soft snores above her head and a blaring alarm to her side. She almost ignores it, almost decides to just curl further into the warmth she’s found herself surrounded in. But old habits die hard. She slips out of bed, flinches when the cold of the floor seeps into her feet.

            But it’s a fitting cold. In a few hours they’ll be on a boat to Atlas. She can only hope that the cold there remains like that of the floor she’s standing on, beneath her.

            Weiss’s steps stutter and stumble, her body still only just waking up, and flicks on the bedroom lights. Yang groans as the light hits her. Weiss watches her, barely restraining a giggle. Yang has always preferred sleeping in and staying warm.

            “Whattimeisit—“ she grumbles, her voice a raspy, sleepy drawl. She buries her head under the covers, “Where’d you go?”

            Weiss barely hears her, lets herself giggle at that last bit. She walks over to their bed, tugs at the covers Yang is hiding behind. “I’m supposed to be the one hesitant about leaving,” she says.

            Yang turns to face her and stretches, eyes still closed. “We could run away. Avoid the maiden stuff altogether. Live off the land.” Her voice is still ragged from sleep, and the concept is definitely appealing. Still, Weiss says nothing as she rummages through her bags, absently making a list of what she has, but give Yang a look that she sees through cracked eyelids. Yang huffs, “Fine. We’ll save the world, I guess.”

            Yang sits up and stretches, reaches her shoulders out behind and above her head until she hears a satisfying pop. Weiss cringes, “Gross.”

            Yang grumbles something that Weiss can’t quite hear, sleepy eyes fixed on her prosthetic resting on the nightstand just out of her reach. Weiss sighs, but it’s entirely affectionate, “Do you want some help?”

            Yang nods. Weiss steps over to the side table and gently lifts her arm before settling nearly in Yang’s lap. A thought occurs to her, as she lifts Yang’s arm to line everything up. Will she get to do this forever? She can briefly see it, her a bit older, a bit wiser, assisting Yang with an even prettier model.

            She’s just about to push everything into place when Yang’s voice softens into a whisper, “I dreamt about you last night.”

            Weiss almost flinches, knowing all too well just what kind of nightmares Yang has, but all she can do is summon up a frown. “Another nightmare?” she asks. But Yang’s hands are steady, and she doesn’t remember any sort of movement on Yang’s part.

            Yang shakes her head, “No, not this time.”

            Weiss feels something warm blossom in her chest and spread, “Well,” she finds herself saying, “I’m certainly glad not all of your dreams about me include something traumatic or awful.”

            Yang hums, and though Weiss isn’t serious, her answer is, “They aren’t.” She hears her arm set into place with a series of clicks. “Thank you.”

            Weiss flushes as Yang sets her left hand on top of hers. She leans her head back, just a bit, and Yang takes it as an invitation to rest their foreheads together, eyes closed and hands touching.

            Suddenly, there’s a bang on the door, and Weiss leaps away from Yang. The door flings open, and Ruby is standing in the doorway, Blake cautiously hovering behind her. “Good morning, Team RWBY!”

            “At least there isn’t a whistle this time,” Blake comments, as though all four of them are picturing their first day at Beacon.

            “I knew I forgot something,” Ruby mumbles, but nearly immediately her attention turns back to Weiss and Yang. “We’re leaving in fifteen minutes.”

            “We’ll be there,” Yang answers, and Weiss finds herself watching Blake and Yang, and somehow the air feels less hostile. More weary than anything.

            Blake shuffles. “See you then.” She waves, and Ruby follows behind her, makes sure to close the door.

            Weiss takes a deep breath. “For the love of God.”

            Yang chuckles. “Yeah, she’s got impeccable senses for when she shouldn’t intrude.”

            “You don’t say,” Weiss replies blandly. “Who would’ve guessed that.”

            “Definitely not me,” Yang says, “Not like I’ve lived with her for nearly seventeen years.”

            Weiss blinks. “That’s not right.”

            Yang raises an eyebrow. “Huh?”

            “Ruby isn’t allowed to be that old.” It feels absurd, that their leader is almost as old as they were when the rest of them had started at Beacon. “She’s supposed to just be a child.”

            Yang laughs. “Trust me, she still is. But you’re right. Time keeps happening. And it reminds me of how much we might have left.” She stops, grips Weiss’s hand a little tighter, “Or how little.”

            Oh. “Is that _really_ the tone you want to set for today?”

            “Yeah, that’s probably not the best idea.” Yang finally slinks out of bed to put what little stuff she has into her bag. “You ready, ice queen? Any moment someone is going to start yelling and then it’s really go-time. But I’ve got your back.”

            She always does, Weiss thinks. She reaches for her hand, metal, but no less comforting than the rest of her, and tangles their fingers together. “Yeah,” she grins, “I’m ready.”

            She knows that with them together, Atlas—or whoever should lie waiting for them there—won’t stand a chance.

+

            With Ironwood providing their team’s ship to Atlas, Yang has expected something with heavy firepower, a military vessel in shining white and steel. But the _Argus Limited_ is just that—limited. It will fit the eleven them, but it’s small, crowned by conspicuous red sails that fold and billow in the wind. She can only wonder if Ironwood sent it because it will be so easy to spot in the ports.

            Qrow and Oscar lead the charge up the plank, and Yang falls into step with Weiss at the back of the procession. Turns to her. “You think we’ll have to share cabins?” she teases. Not like she’d mind. She already has a _very_ compatible roommate.

            Weiss grins and butterflies are sent into a frenzy in Yang's stomach. She slips her hand into Weiss's and twines their fingers together, squeezes softly.

            She studies the girl who has chosen never to leave her.

            She looks like a sunrise, Yang thinks. Like stars that haven't left yet, like soft light and new beginnings. Even shadows paint her in color: shades of blue cast across the curve of her jaw and stretch to color Yang's world the same hue. She feels her heart stutter. Weiss is breathtaking.  
            Yang tightens her grip on Weiss's hand. She wonders if the relic is the only piece of magic she's holding, “You ready?”

            Weiss swings their hands between them forward and then back once, “I think so,” She says. Blue eyes focus on her and her smile turns a little more nervous. Yang leans down to kiss some of the caution away.

            When she leans back, Weiss steps closer. Their fingers stay interlocked even as Weiss's fingers dig into the back of Yang's jacket and Yang brings her prosthetic up to gently cradle the back of Weiss's neck. It's funny, she thinks, that this arm was built for war, not holding people close.

            Perhaps she and Weiss are both well-versed in defiance.

            Weiss leans back this time, though she keeps her arms wrapped around Yang, "Okay. Okay, I think I'm ready now."  

            Yang smirks, " _That's_ what you needed? Snowball, if you just needed some love we could probably spare ten more minutes."

            Weiss blushes head to toe, "Don't call me snowball."

            “Right. I’ll go back to the drawing board with the nicknames,” she says. “In the meantime, we should probably head onto the ship before Nora makes it up to the observation deck.”

            Weiss’s eyes slide to the _Argus Limited._ “Or Sun.”

            “What?”

            Yang’s gaze follows Weiss’s. Sun stands on the second tier of the ship, leaning over the balcony with his hands a makeshift megaphone around his lips.

            “Ahem!” he calls. “Will we be boarding today, ladies?”

            “Yeah, yeah. Give us a minute,” Yang responds, pulling Weiss closer.

            “I’m just saying, it’s not like you’re saying goodbye,” he says, then turns around, leaving them to their last moment on the dock.

            “He’s right,” Weiss says, her smile crinkling her eyes. “This isn’t goodbye.”

            “No. No goodbyes for us,” Yang says. She runs a mechanical thumb over Weiss’s cheek, down to the skin beneath her ear. “So. You want to make this an adventure?”

            Weiss nods, smile glowing. “Lead the way.”

            They break apart, only to link hands as they cross the rest of the bridge, up to the ship and into a new beginning.  
  
  


 

**Author's Note:**

> SHE'S HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> For the past month and a half of piddling away at this with my lovely co-authors Peyton and Sarah, we've finally done it! This fic has been an absolute blast to write, long as it is, and we hope you guys enjoy it! To say we poured our hearts into it would be an understatement. We just really love these fire and ice girls—that's probably why it's so dang (xiao) long. 
> 
> Also, it will be available on Peyton's tumblr soon, and I'll post the rebloggable link here when that happens! In the meantime, hit us all up on Twitter: @lumailia , @greekfiires , and @bicaroiina


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